Send Me On My Way
by Wolf Heart 13
Summary: Because when Max Tennyson agreed to take the gang on the road for the whole summer he knew exactly what he had left himself in for. Then again, maybe not... Rated T for language and themes. Warning: contains Gwevin fluff
1. Prolouge

**AN: its baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack! :D**

**With another tale of randomness and fluff xD this first chapter is kinda short, I know, but I'm sort of preparing for exam season :S the next one will be longer, I swear! xD**

**I'd like to take another opportunity to thank my readers, but I also forgot to mention those who've added me and my stories to their favourites list :D you're all just so awesome you deserve a batch of virtual cookies each :3**

_**Prologue**_

"Come _on_!" Steph shouted down the stairs at Kevin, considering running down to his room and bodily dragging him from the house. He'd gone back for a pair of _socks_ for crying out loud! Like, _half and hour_ ago!

Okay, it was more like three minutes, but still.

"I'm _coming_!" Kevin yelled back, getting annoyed.

"You said that ages ago! Get your butt up here now before I come down there and kick it!"

Kevin shouted something obscure and most probably obscene at her, and there was a brooding and ominous silence from all sides. Until Ben stormed through the open front door and confronted Steph.

"Where the hell is he? If we don't leave now we'll be stuck in the summer traffic on the high way for about _four_ hours!"

"That's what _I_ said!" Steph shook him by the collar of his summer shirt. "But did he listen to me? No! Why? Because I don't have a frickin' Y chromosome!" _Bitch_…

Ben looked thoughtfully down the stairs before smirking up at Steph. "Thinking what I'm thinking?"

It took a moment to click, but when it did, she gave him her best evil grin and they both tore down the stairs.

"Ready or not!" Ben trilled.

"_Here we come!_" Steph chirruped.

Poor Kevin never even saw it coming; one moment he was meticulously repacking his bag, the next Steph had grabbed him by the arms and lifted him up while Ben got a grip on his ankles; and together they raised him from the floor and ran back upstairs, yelling war chants and laughing while Kevin threatened them with eternal hell fire. The bag, sadly, ended up falling back down the stairs, disgorging its innards as it went.

"I'LL KILL YOU-!" Kevin began, but they dumped him on the grass outside his house and ran for the RV, giggling like idiots.

Gwen and Mikey jumped from their perch round the table, scattering Uno cards in all directions. "What the hell?" he demanded, picking them up and shuffling them into order again. "Is he _done_ yet? I'll have a full beard by the time we actually leave!"

The hammering on the door and the curses were answer enough.

"And I gave up my entire summer for _this_…" Mikey sprawled face first on the table top, and pretended to cry.

Gwen patted his head gently, and Steph snorted with laughter. "Whee, look at'im go!"

"How long you think he can keep this up?" Ben asked as the whole vehicle lurched a moment at Kevin's dissent.

"Dunno. How long can the Rust Bucket last?"

"Don't be mean to the Rust Bucket!" Gwen threw her book at Steph, who grinned and hurled it back even harder at Mikey, who in turn yelped loudly and jumped out of his seat.

"Oh, it's _go time_ bird breath!"

Steph flattened Kevin as she ran from the RV and Mikey's wrath.

"Hey-!"

"Gotta fly! See ya,"

"_Get back here Stephenie!_"

"Kevin?" They all stopped in the middle of their tussle to turn to Cari. From this position, Steph had both boys hanging from her in a strangle hold, and she slowly but surely toppled forwards into the dirt.

"What?" Kevin tried to wriggle out from underneath Mikey, who was trying to simultaneously trying to throttle Steph.

Cari held up his kit bag that was overflowing with socks, giving him a wry smile. "Something tells me you might need these,"

"Err, thanks…" he took the bag from her as Mikey and Steph settled their differences and dusted themselves down. "Wasn't my fault!" he added to the accusing look in his mother's eyes.

"Kevin!" Crystal barrelled out of nowhere and hugged him round the middle, making him stumble. "Can't I go with you?"

Poor kid wouldn't live to see the first morning on the road, rate they were going since seven am _today_…

"No. It's for big kids only,"

"But I'll fit in your bag! I won't be any trouble,"

Steph sniggered as Kevin rolled his eyes dramatically.

"Yeah, but if I stuff you in there, there won't be any room for my underwear."

"Argh!" Steph flung her hands over her eyes, the mental image burning her retinas. "God forbid!"

Mikey howled with laughter like a hyaena.

"And you can- shut up!" She had been about to say _bloody well_ but she didn't quite dare to use that language with Cari and Crystal in the vicinity. "I am _not_ sleeping in the same enclosed space as _you_ if you're naked! EWW!"

"Get your mind out the gutter!" Mikey gave her a playful shove and ran back into the RV. "Jesus, Ben! You wouldn't believe the magnitude of dirty thoughts Steph has about our favourite mechanic…"

Ben sounded like a jackal she'd once heard at the zoo.

"Likewise!" Steph blinked and Kevin smacked her round the face with his bag.

"Gah!"

"Kevin," Cari said warningly.

"What!" Kevin drawled, slinging it casually over his shoulder and sauntering over to the Rust Bucket while Steph tried to recover from the stinging sensation in her nose and eyes. "She's Avis, she'll live."

"Your swift and painful death shall be mine!" she launched herself at him, and tackled him to the ground. "A_ha_!"

"Get off me!"

"Git! Pull my hair _one_ more time and I'll-!"

"We're going now!" Ben yelled at them, and the RV shuddered forward by three feet.

They jumped up; Kevin grabbed his bag, and fought to be first on.

"Bye Cari!"

"Wait!"

Steph leant against the doorframe, eyebrow raised; Kevin dumped his bag and ran back outside to his mother. He gave her a quick hug, and lifted Crystal off the ground momentarily in another hug. Steph felt a dull flicker of annoyance as Cain came outside as well, looking decidedly uncomfortable as he sidled over towards Kevin. After he had put his little sister down, the two men looked each other in the eye before Cain attempted to hug Kevin.

Naturally, when Kevin stood stock-still and made no move to reciprocate, Cain gave up instantly and shook his hand instead.

And then Kevin ran back to the Rust Bucket and landed on top of Steph.

"Get out of my way!"

"Get _off_ my spleen!"

"Bye!" Ben waved cheerfully as Max gunned the engine from the drivers seat.

"Ready, kids?"

"Woohoo!" Mikey started doing the old school victory dance ritual that had been performed at the end of every rugby match at their secondary school, and Steph joined in, adding her own voice to the victory chant.

"Freaks," Ben glowered at them and buried himself under the table. "Now _where's_ my Game Boy…?"

"Hey Steph," Mikey had that glint in his eye, and they belted out the _St Trinian's_ school anthem.

"_We can't fake the way we feel! We were born to keep it real! Hockey sticks and balls of steel! We are St Trinian's,_"

"Should I be worried?" Ben asked nonchalantly, wiping something from the screen of his beloved Sumo Slammer's video game and beginning to play.

"Probably," Kevin shrugged.

When Steph failed to get a reaction beyond mild indifference, she started pelting Ben with pretzels and ducked when he threw the box to his game cartridge, cackling with malicious glee.

"Heehee!"

"I hate you so much…"

Steph flashed him her best grin, before draping herself across Kevin's shoulders to look at the cards in his hand. "Go for the straight!"

"Piss _off_, Steph!" he snapped, fist connecting with the side of her head.

"Bitch…" she muttered, nursing her wounded pride and stalking off to find a book to read. See how the prat liked _that_ when she ignored him…

XOXOX

The day was, by and large, a lot less eventful than Max had expected, which was a very pleasant surprise. After half an hour of flicking random objects at each other, both Ben and Steph stopped so they could join in the card game with the others; and so they sat there happily for well over two hours, not quite three, without any major fall outs.

They had to stop briefly to tank up on a few things, and Max let them roam free for half an hour before expecting them back at the RV. It took ten minutes longer than necessary to round everyone up, and it left the man laughing when Kevin threw himself dramatically over the long bench seat right at the back of the Rust Bucket, an arm drawn up over his eyes. Steph poked him in stomach, making him jump, but otherwise eliciting no reaction.

"You're boring," she announced with a sniff, and scuttled off towards Ben who had a huge bag of candy in his hands. "Gimme!"

Mikey slid onto one of the bunks with a laugh and nudged Kevin with his foot. "Could be worse," he began, but Kevin sprang to his feet and pinned him to the wall.

"Say _could be raining_ and I'm gonna slap you into next week!"

"Kevin," Gwen put both her hands on his forearm and pushed down so that Mikey could wriggle free.

"Every time someone says that in front of me," he snapped indignantly, gesturing wildly at the beautiful, clear if somewhat hazy sky outside the window. "It rains! With hail. And lightning!"

Gwen was rolling her eyes and flicking a hand in his face to discourage him following her. "Whatever." It wasn't enough to deter him from tailing her to the front of the RV. "We're not discussing this,"

"Gwen!" he whined, hanging himself over the headrest of her seat and poking her gently in the back of her head. "Why won't you listen to me?"

"Because you're being ridiculous!"

"Shit!"

They both looked up instantly, and Kevin barrelled his way to the back again where Mikey was staring out the window. Max checked in the rear view mirror to see them staring out of the back window.

"There's a wispy grey cloud!" Mikey waved at it wildly. "Look! There's you're hail and lightning," he laughed at Kevin's scowl. "You're such a spack," he dodged being pitched head first to the floor and slunk away with an evil grin.

"I'm telling you!" Kevin said, returning to Gwen's side. "It's gonna rain like all the saints in heaven left the taps running!"

Gwen rolled her eyes, and scowled when Max laughed. "Didn't know you knew so much about The Bible, Kevin," he chuckled.

"Nah," Kevin shook his head in an attempt to get his ever-growing fringe out of his eyes. "It just makes me sound smart," his hair slid back across his eyes, and he frowned upwards at it.

Gwen giggled and brushed it out of the way herself, tucking it behind his ears. "You need a hair cut," she suggested.

That boy was gone faster than you could say _screwdriver_.

"Ha!" Steph jeered from somewhere behind them. "The Phantom Scissors are never too far away for – argh!"

"Get away from me!"

"Hey! Piss off, Steph! I'm trying to kill this boss!

"No one gives a crap Benny! I'm trying to give Kevin a haircut!"

"Touch with that thing _once_ and I'll throttle you till you die!"

"I stab you in the back a thousand times until you die!"

Max slowed as they pulled up to the end of a long line of traffic, and saw Mikey standing in between Steph and Kevin, arms thrown artistically into the air, earning stares from all around.

"Everyone was making death threats," he said, innocent as can be. "I just wanted to follow the trend."

Kevin and Steph exchanged looks before diving for Mikey. "Glomp!" she shrieked, and Mikey yelped.

"Stop saying that!" Kevin shouted at her.

Max had to turn his attention back to the road as the traffic shifted, and smiled at Gwen's despairing look.

"They do this every year…"

"Kevin and Mikey are new to this," he reminded her. "Don't worry, the high spirits will die down after a bit,"

"Grandpa," Gwen gave him a pleading look. "Trust me, they _don't_."

Gwen was, however, proved wrong much later on. They stopped by the roadside after the traffic jam for a quick round of sandwiches before Max was behind the wheel again, leaving the kids to their own devises. It wasn't for quite a while that he realised there were no arguments or raised voices, and only after he'd pulled into a space for the night did he see why.

Kevin was once again sprawled across the back seat, with one foot braced against the wall, and Gwen curled up between him and the back of the seat. He had both his arms wrapped securely around her, and her face was half hidden in the crook of his neck. Flopped in a pile on the floor alongside was Mikey, tucked in tail to nose with his ears flicking back and forth every so often in his sleep; Ben was leaning against his flanks, mouth hanging wide open as he snored, the game boy held slackly in his nerveless hand. Steph was lying on the floor with her legs pressed flat against the wall, ankles crossed with her arms laid flat out either side of her, the book she'd been reading from fallen haphazardly over her face.

It was a picture of complete tranquillity.

Max smiled to himself, thinking about how this summer would be a great experience for all of them. He likewise settled in to sleep, expecting an early start with the kids still dead to the world.

XOXOX

"Uncle Max!" Steph shook him violently until he roused himself from sleep. "Uncle Max! It's raining cats and dogs!"

"Hey!" Mikey shouted from the front passenger seat over the sound of hailstones hitting the roof of the RV. "I resent that statement on intergalactic racial grounds!"

"No one cares!" couldn't they see it? "Kevin was right! The bloody idiots left the taps on!" why couldn't they see it – Kevin had been _right_.

"What if you don't believe in heaven?" Ben asked, making a show of brushing his hair in the mirror by the tiny bathroom door.

"Well, I don't believe in hell, so…" Mikey shrugged grandly.

Steph rolled her eyes and looked to the backbench seat where Kevin was staring morosely at the shifting grey blob that seemed to have swallowed their world up and then sneezed over them.

"Why not?" Gwen asked, pulling her hair into her now normal and boring ponytail. Steph liked it better when it was down…

"Well, hell is of your own making – like, making your own personal hell…and if I don't believe in hell, I can't really go there, can I?"

No one could really argue with his logic, so Steph gave up on Max and went to sit beside Kevin. She punched his arm, and elicited no reaction what so ever.

"Dude, say something." He pestered him some more.

Kevin answered with one, gloomily delivered swear word.

"We're happy this morning," Steph said in a bored tone, unable to work any enthusiasm into her voice.

"I told you all so," he said suddenly, hiding his head in the circle of his arms against the window.

Steph wanted the summer to be over now; it was too much like English fall…

Wait, _autumn_!

"This sucks…" she beat her head against the glass, feeling even more depressed.

Gwen sidled over and wrapped her arms around Kevin's shoulders and said, "It's not going to last the _whole_ of summer,"

"In my experience, when Brits are abroad," Steph muttered ominously, thinking back on many a visit to distant shores. "The rain follows them."

"Like _where_?" Ben demanded, shaking his head back and forth, trying to fluff up his hair.

"_No_ no no," Mikey tapped him on the shoulder before settling into a stance. "Like this," he head banged the air most violently, making his hair explode in a puff of inky black hair.

"Oh, you know," Steph spun round on her knees and sank into the correct posture for sitting on a seat. "All the places you usually associate with sunshine." She started counting them off on her fingers. "Italy, Malta, southern Spain, Kenya, Egypt, South Africa…"

"It all depends on the time of year you go," Mikey began, but Steph cut him off.

"Their summer time! Don't bloody talk to me about weather!"

"But if you're going somewhere like Kruger," Mikey pointed out annoyingly, as River often told them when she went on one of her travel story sprees. "Then a bit of rain is a good thing cause then all the animals come out of hiding,"

"Never saw a lion!" Steph taunted him. "And you sang all those songs…"

"I saw lions," Mikey blinked. "But I was in the Masi Mara. Just cause it's further up the continent…"

"I don't care, _I_ saw lions in Kruger, and _you_ didn't!"

"Doesn't it make you feel so small and insignificant when your best friend's been to more places on your home planet than you have?" Kevin asked, still morose.

"Not really." Ben shrugged. "I'm still superior in every possible way, so it doesn't really bother me."

"I saw lions. In the wild. I win," Steph beamed at them until Mikey coughed and spoke up.

"I did see three leopards in the space of four hours in Kruger, which was pretty impressive."

Steph's jaw tried to dislocate itself from her skull. In a flat monotone she said, "_What?_"

"I thought you knew," Mikey shrugged. "If you paid more attention to my Facebook you'd know I put up a few pictures last year when I was ranting at River and her blondie friend Rowena or whatever her name is. Because they went the month before me."

"Where abouts?" Gwen asked, and Steph hung her head in despair. "A girl who left our school this year was going to…oh, where was it? Sounded like Elephant…"

"Olifants. I've been there!" Mikey enthused. "I loved it so much,"

"Where exactly is that?"

"It's in Kruger National Park. I've been to Skukuza, Lower Sabie, Olifants, and Satara. Wasted about three months of my life in that park, but I saw three leopards in one day near Lower Sabie. Not many people can say that,"

"I'd love to go to Africa," Gwen said, stroking Kevin's hair. "I've only ever been to Europe…"

"Depends where you're going,"

Steph wanted to cry; Ben was preening, Kevin was moping, Uncle Max was dead to the world, and these two were having a nice little chat about things she couldn't join in with.

"I personally love South Africa, although the only bit I didn't like was when I was mugged in Cape Town."

Gwen looked freaked out by the thought.

"Oh come off it! I've been loads of places," Steph said, disgusted. "And so has River! And the only place I ever got mugged was London!"

"And I think River got mugged once in Nairobi…" Mikey said thoughtfully. "And Mumbai," he added.

"What did you do?" Gwen asked, still stroking Kevin's hair in a way that made Steph feel uncomfortable with the display of affection – especially since he wasn't reacting in any way, shape or form.

"Well, _I_ had been running around with a decoy wallet in my pocket with about fifty Rand in it, so I just handed it over."

"River does that all the time," Steph said, suddenly feeling as depressed as Kevin sounded. "Like, even when she goes to Vancouver or Seattle."

"You know," Mikey said thoughtfully. "I think the only places River ever got mugged were in England and America.

Kevin looked up, loosing the morose look for a moment. "She also said that someone tried to in Paris one time."

"_I_ don't remember this!" Steph said indignantly, refusing to accept that she knew less about River than Kevin did. "Why don't I know about this?"

"She said it was the one time she beat the guy up because he didn't have a weapon on him."

"Oh yeah, the guy in London had a gun or something," Mikey added, lost in his thoughts.

"Well!" Ben clapped them all on the back and sauntered towards the front of the RV. "Let's resolve to do as little being mugged as possible this summer,"

"Cheers to that!" Mikey fist pumped the air, then looked at the bored expressions on everyone else.

Kevin slumped forward, head smacking into the glass window. "I wanna go home,"

Gwen leant her forehead against his back, between his shoulder blades. "It's not so bad…"

"Yea'i'is," Steph slurred her words together as she yawned.

"Well, would you look at that?" They all looked up to see Max standing beside Ben, staring into the stormy world outside. "Guess Kevin was right after all,"

"I am _never_ admitting Kevin was right," Ben sulked as Max ruffled his hair.

"Just cause you can't admit you're so inferior," Kevin sneered, suddenly loosing his depression in a flash.

"Or that certain parts of his anatomy leave a lot to be desired compared to yours," Steph sniggered.

She earned so many looks from the occupants of the Rust Bucket that she almost felt ashamed of herself.

"Can I just point out that due the fact that Kevin is both taller and more muscular than Ben and that I have seen both in swim wear that it doesn't take the brains of Britain,"

Mikey pretended to gag and said, "Or imagination…"

"To work out who would be lacking in that general department."

What was worse? Uncle Max rolling his eyes? Maybe Ben's look of utter horror… Mikey's raised and sarcastic eyebrow? Or Kevin's black look of anger? The funniest had to be Gwen's, as she was hiding her face in Kevin's back, and from what little Steph could see, her skin was bright red.

"I'm gonna kill you," Kevin said in a low voice.

"Puh!" Steph waved the threat away. "Please, you've been saying that for months now! What makes you think that – Gah!"

Kevin pounced on her, and this time his punches actually hurt. A _lot_.

"Get off get off get off get off-!"

"DIE!"

"I hope this isn't setting the tone for the next few weeks…" Mikey's voice was just heard over Kevin's yells of divine retribution.

"I'll fight you to the last you bastard!" she screamed in Kevin's face.

Then he wrenched her arm back at a painful angle, and winced when she yelled in pain right down his ear.

"Bitch!"

"I'm so done with you!"

"I'm going to eat your soul for breakfast!"

"Breakfast anyone?" Ben asked in an almost cheerful tone.

"No, I'm no done killing her yet!"

"Likewise, you bastard!"

"My mom and dad were married you dweeb!"

"Is this the face of someone who gives a shit? No!"

"Grandpa? Can we go home now?" Gwen whined.

"Afraid not. River and Taylor are expecting us, wouldn't want to disappoint them now, would we?"

"Screw River!" Steph tried to get Kevin in a headlock – failed, and tipped them both onto the floor. "Kevin needs to suffocate now!"

"That's a mental image I could live without…" Ben groaned.

"Hey!" Steph sat up on her knees and pointed at him with a snarl. "And you said _my_ mind was in the gutter! Buck up Ben, you bloody hypocrite,"

Kevin grabbed her round the neck and flung her to the floor, where he proceeded to sit on her back.

"I'm not moving till you say sorry for being a pervert." He said stubbornly.

Steph managed to raise her head and drum her fingers speculatively against the floor. "You'll be here a _long_ time mate," she said, bored already.

"That looks kinda dodgy from here," Mikey pulled a face. "Not gonna lie…"

"Oh, it's _very_ comfortable," Steph said seductively, an idea hitting her on the spot. "He has such a nice _firm_ arse,"

"Argh!" Kevin stood up and brushed himself down before running to hide behind Gwen. "Gross!"

"Haha!" Steph jumped to her feet and sauntered towards the fridge. "I win! Steph one, Kevin zero. Good luck with that!"

She turned to grin at him, and saw him rocking himself back and forth while Gwen tried to console him. "I feel unclean…Gwen, hand me the bleach, I need to wash my brain out."

Gwen glowered at Steph, although there was a flicker of amusement in her eyes. "Now look what you did to him!"

"C'mon, he was traumatised and mentally scarred before I met him. It wasn't me!" she took the apple juice from the fridge, shook it to find the container had less than a glass's worth in it, and drank straight from the carton.

"I still blame you,"

"Why?"

"Because you spend the most time with him, and whenever I get him back from you, he's always mentally distressed." Gwen snapped.

"Trying mentally _touched in the head_…" Ben grumbled.

"So…breakfast, kids? How about a nice wombat omelette," Uncle Max began.

Steph and Ben piled onto the backseat with Kevin and Gwen, clinging to them for dear life while Mikey folded his arms and leant against the wall, eye brows raised.

"I'm scared!" Ben squealed, pulling Gwen in front of his as a meat shield.

Steph grabbed Kevin and clung to his neck, curling herself up against his chest in as tight a ball as she could manage. "Hold me," she begged.

"Eww!" Kevin tipped her onto the floor. "Yuck! It touched me again!"

"Don't be such babies!" Gwen demanded, trying to remove Ben. "Get _off_ me!"

Kevin plucked her cousin from her, and dumped him on top Steph.

"OW!"

"Your problem now,"

"Piss off!"

The ensuing argument took them all up to lunchtime, by which point the hail had stopped and the sun was shining so brilliantly that none of the noticed at all.

XOXOX

**This was slightly more random than I originally intended and I swear I'll try to be more serious in later chapters xD**

**I have no idea how long this story will be, but I can safely say it won't be as long as previous stories of mine, and then I intend to do my own thing before following Ultimate Alien for no other reason than because I feel like it and also feel that I need to sort my time lines out because I somehow managed to cram about what is in the cartoon a years worth of episodes into about five months…**

**So yeah, do let me know what you think and stuff, you know the drill xD**

**xxx**


	2. For The Birds

**AN: …did I say a week? I meant two months! :S aheheheh…I'm embarrassed to call myself a fanfic writer after that long interlude xD exams ended ages ago but I got so caught up in everything else, including a few major projects for school next year that need extended and undivided attention.**

**This has been written in drips and drabs, so it might be disconnected and not really flowing well, but I didn't want to leave it too long otherwise I'd loose the plot and possibly the will to live as far as writing goes xD**

**Anyways, its finally here! :D but before we get started, I'd like to thank the people who've been sending me messages and adding me to all their lists and leaving me lovely reviews :) I can't name you all because my email accounts jammed so I can't find your usernames but you can all have a virtual hug and a life times supply of cookies because you're awesome! :3 thanks for all the love and support, you guys really make writing worth while!**

**And now, on with the show! :D (finally!)**

_**For The Birds**_

"Are we there yet?" Kevin blurted out, earning him a dig in the ribs.

"Start this game again…" Steph threatened half heartedly, moodily stabbing at a pot of yoghurt.

"Just another half hour and we'll be at the bird of prey sanctuary," Grandpa said, pulling off the highway and onto a dusty, bumpy dirt track headed further inland. "Then you can all stretch your legs."

Gwen had tried to read her book in peace, but Steph and Kevin's bickering was far too distracting to concentrate. That, coupled with the fact that Ben was snoring loudly in his bunk, and Mikey was using the kitchen utensils as an improvised steel pan band, didn't help to ease the headache her skull were harbouring. Eventually, she got up from the table and went to curl up on the backseat instead, grabbing a spare pillow as she went and ramming it over her head in the hopes that she could block out the sounds of Kevin and Steph squabbling.

After only lying down for five minutes, someone poked her in the ribs and she sat up groggily to glower at Mikey, who grinned in response; mismatched eyes bright with humour.

"Woah, it's like a strawberry haystack! Very fetching on you. What's the name of your stylist? I need to get their number,"

Gwen smacked him smartly round the face with her pillow, and he dodged with a move that belonged in the realms of _The Matrix_. It would have been a brilliant manoeuvre if not for the fact that the Rust Bucket hit a bump in the road, and Mikey lost his tenuous balance; he toppled over backwards, and managed to maintain dignity long enough to perform a perfect backwards roll before Ben stood up from the table and tripped over him. This in turn caused Ben to bring Steph, standing by the sink making sandwiches, down with him.

"Opps," Mikey said unashamedly.

Gwen yawned widely, already actively tuning the angry voices out of her hearing.

And then it struck her; Ben had been _asleep_ five minutes ago…

Looking up from her position, she saw that all three bunks were a mess, and that Kevin had squeezed himself into the remaining space on the very end of the sofa seat with his feet braced against the wall of the bunk unit, nose buried in a book. And, upon closer inspection, it turned out to be her copy of _Dark Fall_.

"Hey," she poked him in the ribs and Kevin looked up, a faraway look in his eyes. "How long was I asleep for?"

"Two hours," he shrugged and checked the battered watch around his wrist. "Thereabouts. We got lost," he nodded to the front of the RV, where Steph was unravelling a large OS map of the area and trying to read it while Ben hurled insults at Mikey and swore to turn him into a hearthrug.

"I hate gravity," was all Mikey had to say for himself as he slunk to the back and phased into a heap of fur and a dejectedly wagging tail.

Gwen scratched his ears absently and put a hand on the spine of her book, lowering it so that Kevin had to face her over the issue.

"What?" he snapped in an overly aggressive tone.

Unfazed by this display, Gwen said, "You're reading the crappy romance novel about gay vampires. I'd like an explanation," it was too good an opportunity to resist winding him up.

Kevin didn't disappoint; he scowled at her. "For your information," he sneered, "I was just skimming through to see just how bad it really is. Like you said," his smirk was self-assured, and Gwen resolved to wipe it from his face. "You can't knock something till you've tried it."

"Just skimming?" she asked for clarification, plucking the book from his hands and checking the page number.

"Yeah," Kevin's face was full of youthful, arrogant pride.

Which made it all the more amusing to watch him deflate when she said. "Skimming to page one-eighty?"

Kevin stared at her blankly. "Err…"

She smiled, and leant over to kiss his cheek. It caught her off guard when he turned his head deliberately so that she missed his cheek by miles, kissing his lips instead. Her smile widened into a grin to match his, but they were interrupted by Mikey's soft whining as Ben approached with a face like thunder, and Steph shouted down the vehicle to get Kevin's attention.

"Oi! Sparky, get your arse up here and help me find the right map! My badge is spacking out and I can't work it,"

"No rest for the wicked," Mikey snickered, making a point of licking his paws in a feline manner. "Do us a favour, Kev, and smack her one for will you?"

Kevin aimed a kick at him, which was met with a rebuff and a snarl. The two boys stared each other down – or at least Gwen assumed they did, since Mikey's muscular, fur covered shoulder was in the way. By the time he'd settled back down on the floor, ice and chocolate eyes glaring, Kevin had already made it to Steph's side and was ripping her badge to pieces with a screwdriver.

"He doesn't like being called Kev a lot of the time," Gwen said, placing a soothing hand on the top of his head. "I think it was a nickname he had in the Null Void."

"Ah," Mikey twisted round to lick her hand in a friendly manner. "Understood."

Gwen smiled, scratching him under the chin; it was like having a huge puppy dog as a pet.

"Eww!" Ben complained, pushing the book off the sofa seat and forcing Gwen to budge up to accommodate his gangly legs in the confined space. At least Kevin had had the decency to sprawl his limbs where they didn't interfere with her nap…he really did spoil her in certain respects.

Mikey growled deep in his throat but otherwise didn't react.

"Can you not try to flirt with my cousin? Especially when you're all weird and wolfish! It's bad enough watching _Kevin _get all mushy and shit,"

"Ben!" Gwen tried to slap him but he grabbed her wrist and twisted it to an awkward angle, so awkward in fact she couldn't defend herself against it.

"Just cause I don't favour you the same treatment," Mikey grumbled, resting his head on his enormous paws and exhaling heavily, ruffling the shaggy hair that was slowly growing out into a sort of mane atop his head.

"Gross! Why'd I want a slobbery kiss from a _dog_?"

"Ben! Let go,"

"No way! You're just gonna beat me up!"

"With good reason," Mikey snorted, tail thumping against the floor rhythmically.

"Okay!" Steph bounded back down the RV, nearly pitching head first into the floor as the traversed an overly large pothole in the road, and stalked the rest of the way, scowling. "We reckon three quarter's of an hour, and we know because the sign on the road said so!"

"Then why are you reckoning?" Ben demanded.

"Because it's a thing I say!"

"It's actually River's thing," Mikey put in.

"Well, _yeah_," Steph said bluntly, pushing her ever-growing fringe out of her eyes. "But she got it off some other girl she went to school with in Plymouth, so-"

"And the moral of this story is?" Ben said loudly over their little conversation.

"Forty-five minutes!" Steph shouted back. "So!" she clapped her hands together and scuttled off to the kitchen area again. "I hope you like chicken!"

"Eww!" Ben complained. "Chicken sandwiches…"

"As long as it's not tuna!" Mikey's head snapped up so suddenly it made Gwen jump.

"'Course not!" Steph snarled, clearly offended.

"Why not?" Gwen asked him.

Mikey turned his head to face Gwen with an ambiguous look in his eyes. "Steph nearly killed me once when she gave me tuna. I had a very violent allergic reaction to it, and as much as we act like we'd love to rip each other's throats out, Steph's never really forgiven herself…"

"Bloody stupid _mutt_!" Steph muttered darkly to herself, throwing a packet of bread around. "Unknown allergic reactions…" she said scathingly. "Giving me a bloody heart attack and all…_bitch_!"

Mikey sighed heavily, and her head plonked down onto his paws again. "But she got me to the hospital and everything…I still have the scars from the adrenaline shot they had to give me,"

"Cool!" Ben said, morbidly fascinated.

Gwen, on the other hand, wasn't overly impressed by the thought of accidental death, or having a large needle anywhere near your heart. Just the thought of one of those lethal looking surgical implements trained on her made Gwen outward and inwardly cringe. "I've never noticed you having a scar on your chest," she said eventually when Steph had boiled down to brooding silence. "And you run around enough at the beach without a shirt on…"

"Oh, it's really small," Mikey said, sitting up a bit and turning round to look at her, tail swishing back and forth to an erratic rhythm. "You can barely see it, but it's still there. Don't really think about it most of the time…"

"So why did you bring it up?" Ben asked, nudging Mikey's hind leg with his foot.

Mikey yelped and Ben stopped. It took a moment of rearranging himself before Mikey spoke again. "Just some random conversation I had with Sally before we left. She had a tuna sandwich and I had to apologise and walk away. When she came after me without it I told her the story, and she dumped the sandwiches and bought a chicken one instead so we could still sit and talk. Such a waste of perfectly good food…!" he lamented.

"I thought you'd be happy about it," Ben said, surprised.

"Ben, no offence mate, but within Earth's atmosphere, you aren't exactly well travelled." Mikey sniffed. "I've been round a bit, especially Africa and Asia. And you must have heard River harping on about it too; when you see the conditions some people live in, you learn not to take our neat little western bubble for granted."

Gwen laid a hand on his shoulder, and he flopped his head back to the floor with a sigh. "That's a sensible way of thinking."

"Just don't be one of those people who makes a song and dance out of it," Mikey pleaded. "There was this one girl who went to Cambodia with me and some of the guys from Havant College, who made _such_ a fuss when we got back! It was like, every time you said something like 'oh I don't want that' she was right in your face screaming that you _had_ to eat it or else it would make the Asian children cry. She was such an idiot! Yeah, sure; be grateful for what you have and that you live in a country with a stable government and all that, but don't make a martyr out of yourself for the people who aren't as lucky."

"Sounds like you really hate this girl," Ben sniggered.

"Hate's a bit of a strong word. I find her intensely _irritating_, don't get me wrong. I mean, what sort of point are you trying to make when you tell everyone else you have to be grateful and not waste the food given to you, when you run around shrieking about how you're not going to eat today because you feel bad for those with nothing, when you should be taking advantage of the wonderful life providence has given you."

Gwen cocked her head to one side as she thought about it. "You get bigots everywhere." She said eventually.

"No school would be complete without one!" Ben laughed as Steph hurled a chicken sandwich at him, catching it one handed and spreading crumbs everywhere.

"Yeah, you fit right in with that role, don't you?" Steph smiled sweetly at his scowl.

"Fixed it,"

Steph spun round to have her badge forced up her nose as Kevin walked past. "Cheers, mate," she said, stuffing it in her pocket. "Sandwich?"

Kevin gave her a sarcastic look.

"Its free food!" she wheedled, dangling the bait. "That's the best kind of food, Kevin!"

"Is this the face of someone who gives a crap?" he motioned to his expression, which Gwen couldn't see with his back to her.

"I'm gonna be pedantic and say yes. Fancy some greens with that?"

Kevin turned his back on Steph, stepped over Mikey and gently pushed Gwen closer to Ben so he could squeeze onto the sofa at the other end. He proceeded to sling an arm around her shoulders and prop his feet up on the crown of Mikey's head. Mikey growled long and low in his throat before snapping his jaws at Kevin's ankles.

"Does my skull _look_ like a goddamn footrest?"

"Yup," he said unconcernedly.

Mikey cursed under his breath, ears flat against his skull in protest. He perked right up when Steph threw him a chicken drumstick, it had Gwen and Ben rolling with laughter while Kevin stared at him in disbelief.

Steph chucked the article of food onto the floor, not two feet from Mikey's nose; his head snapped up and his gaze zeroed in on the meat, just before he pounced as a lion does on TV, nearly knocking Kevin off the sofa in his haste to claim the meat for himself.

"Isn't that, like, _really_ bad for your stomach?" Ben asked, craning to see Mikey's reaction.

Eating with great relish and gusto, Mikey paused long enough to say, "Very _strong_ stomach acid," before he ripped the meat from the bones with indecent enthusiasm. When he had sated his hunger he crawled back to his previous spot on the floor, this time making sure Kevin couldn't use him as a leaning post by dropping down in front of Gwen, yawning widely. "The bones will dissolve in my stomach before they reach the intestines."

"I wish _I_ was a Lupus," Ben said wistfully.

"Dude," Kevin said. "You've got a watch that turns you into _loads_ of different aliens, _including_ two of the Transmorphor species! What are you complaining about?"

"But its not the same!" Ben insisted, brandishing the new and unimproved Ultimatrix under Gwen's nose. "I can't do stuff like Mikey all the time! And besides, this crappy watch keeps crapping out on me! Albedo _sucks_ at this…"

Mikey threw his head back and barked with laughter. "Be grateful for what you have, Benny boy!"

By the time Steph returned with the rest of lunch, there was a full-scale argument going on, and Gwen had neatly tuned them all out of her hearing. It was a great relief when not long after Ben was glaring out the window by the table, and started bouncing excitedly in his seat, yelling, "I see a sign!"

"Really!" Mikey shrieked, in his human form and tackling Ben against the seats in his haste to see for himself. "Is it a burning bush? Are you actually the reincarnation of Moses?"

"Bird of Prey Sanctuary!" Ben trilled.

"Woohoo!" Steph flattened them all as she joined the rabble. "We're gonna see vultures and falcons and eagles and _raptors_-"

"Those are dinosaurs, numbskull!" Ben spat, trying to wrestle her out of the way so he could look for the next sign. "They died out millions of years ago!"

"No, actually." Mikey chipped in with his best soothing and informative tone. "There is a type of modern bird known as a raptor, but I can't remember the specific…"

"I don't _care_, Michael!" Ben yelled at him.

"I'm _not_ a gay douche bag sparkly vampire wannabe!" he shouted back. "That feckin' _git_ Raising Star or whatever the hell his name is can kiss my-!"

Gwen, who was standing by the kitchen unit, leaning against the counter, inclined her head towards Kevin's shoulder. She sighed heavily, closed her eyes, and said, "What's the ETA now?"

"Five minutes!" Grandpa called from the front.

No one else heard apparently, since the other three were still fighting.

"Could be worse," Kevin snickered, giving Gwen a bear hug. "Could be…" he laughed when she scowled and slapped him. "Snowing! I was gonna say snowing!"

"Just shut up already…"

XOXOX

"Bloody hell!" Mikey flung himself at the enclosure, leaning against the chain link fence set about three feet in front of the wire mesh that kept the predatory birds at bay. It was one he remembered seeing in a similar institute in South Africa; but for the beak and the thick thatch of brown and white feathers with the black sort of trouser legs on its limbs, it could have been one of Animo's dinosaur ninjas.

"Wow! I remember those," Steph yelled, throwing herself at Mikey's back and pinning him to the fence. "River's gonna flip when she sees this!" she said with a fierce grin, raising her phone up to take a picture.

"Can't…breathe…" Mikey wheezed.

"Big bastards, aren't they?" Steph called to Kevin, leaving Mikey to slump against the fence, sucking in lungfuls of air and whimpering pitifully.

"Weird looking," Kevin said, coming to stand beside Mikey and inspect the bird more closely, who was giving them a look that felt rather foreboding.

"Oooh!" Ben bounced up on Mikey's other side and pointed, saying, "Lunch!"

Mikey laughed loudly and turned in time to see Gwen trying to sneak past him and follow Max to the entrance to pay. He grabbed her round the waist and tucked her into his side so that she was sandwiched between him and Kevin. "Thought you could slip past me," he teased, ruffling her red hair into a haystack. "I have satellite ears!" He yelped when Steph flicked said satellite ear, nearly jumping out of his own skin.

"Didn't hear that one coming, did you?" she grinned, and ran away when he gave chase.

"No funny business!" Gwen yelled after them, just before Mikey had been about to go all Lupus on Steph's arse. It was probably a good thing she said that, and a good thing Mikey kept up his rugby training.

"Argh!" Steph shrieked as Mikey tackled her to the ground.

"Aha!"

Ben was pointing and laughing from afar, and Mikey could hear Kevin and Gwen voicing their approval at the comedic value of what they wee doing, and he would have been laughing himself if Steph hadn't elbowed him in the face and run away screaming about indecent assault, drawing unwanted attention from the group of people leaving the sanctuary, escorting a few young children.

Mikey scrambled to his feet, dusted himself down, and strolled over to Gwen, who was still giggling. He made a very exaggerated bow, bending right at the waist so that his nose was touching his legs.

"So glad my lady finds my antics amusing,"

Steph tried to sneak up behind him and push him over – she succeeded only in that both Mikey and Gwen ended up on the ground, but he went down fighting heroically, flattening poor Gwen in the process.

"Please, please!" Ben said, waving his hands in the air, head cast to the ground with his eyes closed, a small but superior smile gracing his lips. "A little decorum."

Mikey sat back up and crawled away from Gwen's fiery glare. "A bit too late to be asking for that, mate."

Kevin just snickered, and his grin widened when Gwen aimed a punch and he caught her fist in his hand. "Tired of your pet dog?" he taunted.

"Hey!" Mikey bounced to his feet, knocking Steph over in the process. "I take offence to that! I'm _clearly_ a Wolf, and nothing less," he sniffed loudly with distain and turned on his heel to flounce away.

It was such a pity that his shoelaces were in the way.

"Youch!"

"Ha!"

"You fail at life," Steph was practically on her knees with laughter.

"Oh well," Mikey shook the dust from his hair and grinned up at his friends. "At least I kept my dignity."

"What dignity?" Ben demanded.

"Come on, kids!" Max called from the entrance. "Let's go!"

"Well," Mikey explained, shaking himself down to dislodge the dirt from his clothes. "My trousers didn't fall down. I consider that a good thing, and thus I still have some semblance of dignity."

When Steph ran up behind him and stuck her thumbs through the belt loops of his jeans Mikey took the chance to scream, "_Stop trying to get in my pants, Steph!_" making a group of middle-aged women wearing very conservative clothing look up in alarm.

After Steph and Ben had stopped laughing, and Gwen had smacked him round the side of the head, Mikey failed to dodge Kevin's punch. He stared the guy down before snarling, "Don't mock our accent!" Kevin hissed.

"But it wasn't," Mikey blinked. "American accents vary as much as English, or any other dialect or language, for that matter. I was going for a valley girl tone,"

Kevin also smacked him, just upside the head instead. "Don't." was all he said.

"Oh, come on! I take the piss out of English accents too! Wanna here my impersonation of a northerner?" he stopped as the others walked away without a response. "Hey, _northerner_, Steph! Northerner…anyone? Oh okay, I'll just shut up then."

XOXOX

Kevin watched Gwen studiously from afar, and Steph in turn watched him. "You know," she said conversationally. "Soft and gooey has always creeped me out, but so much more on _you_,"

"No," Kevin replied, quickly looking at a plaque describing the diet of the European eagle owl as Gwen glanced over at them. "I'm thinking how best to scare her,"

Steph waved brightly at Gwen, and took a picture of her and Mikey who was giving her bunny ears. "This dating malarkey's weird…"

"Well, she deserves it," Kevin went back to his vigil as Gwen wondered away, leaving Mikey staring at a small and inconsequential bird that had had its information plaque so heavily grafitied that it was impossible to read.

"How do you figure that?" It was very hard to follow his thought process when it came to Gwen.

"Well, she's trying to wind me up. So I'm gonna do the same to her,"

As they watched, Gwen rushed back to Mikey, grabbed his hand and pulled him along to the next enclosure. He looked surprised, bemused even, but he went along with it, giving the same pained look he gave when he did baby sitting for young, unruly children of vague adult acquaintances. Indecently, the same look when Kev and the twins descended upon him.

"I guess…" Steph shrugged. She would have done something like throw a bundle of weeds from the wayside at her personally, since Gwen wouldn't take kindly to having a fist fight.

"Hey!" Ben bounced out of nowhere.

"Gah!" Steph clutched her pounding heart. "Bitch! What the hell?"

"Ice cream?" he offered her a choc ice.

Steph seized it before his hand was even fully outstretched. "I take back the mean things I was just about to say to you,"

"Kevin?" Ben waved it in their friend's face.

"Yeah, sure." He took it without looking, eyes still fixed on Gwen and brain working away at how best to…whatever he was planning to do.

"You know," Steph said, munching away on her choc-ice as Ben went off to give the others ice cream. "I don't get you, sometimes,"

"What do you mean?" Kevin deigned to grace her with his full and undivided attention, tearing his eyes away from Gwen to do so.

Steph jabbed her choc-ice at her and Mikey, before turning back to Kevin. "I get you, nearly _all_ the time. Which, if I'm honest, is actually kinda scary. I've known you for…what, getting on for half a year? And yet, it feels like I've known you my whole life! By the way," she added when he started snickering. "That ain't a complement most of the time. Anyway, so I get why you act the way you do and why you're such a git most of the time. And I know more or less when it's appropriate to take the piss. And then!" she waved her ice cream around like a crusader from one of Dylan's in depth historical RPGs for the PC. "_She_ comes along, and you just melt into a puddle of jelly. What the hell!"

"Because she'd the only person round here worth being nice to," Kevin said simply, downing half his ice cream in one go, and moving off in stealth mode.

"Oi! Get your arse back here! What do you mean _only_ person? Aren't I worth the trouble?" Steph shouted at his retreating back.

Kevin spun on his back leg to face her, still walking backwards. "Trust me when I say that, I wouldn't have you any other way Steph," he said solemnly.

"Aww," Steph put her hands over her heart and grinned. "That's the nicest thing anyone's said to me since this road trip began!"

"Cause I can barely stand you enough as it is," he went on, smirking. "And I seriously doubt any changes would make an improvement."

"Oh, you just signed your death warrant, good sir," Steph smiled sweetly and threw herself at him in a terrible rugby tackle.

"Go on!" Mikey yelled from the sidelines while Ben and Gwen laughed. "Give it some welly! No! You egit, like you're trying to throw him over your shoulder! Go for the knee, the _knee_!"

Steph yelped as Kevin brought his fist down on the small of her back, winding her momentarily and leaving a nasty bruise. "He's a big lad! Its all this body fat,"

"I'm _not_ fat!"

"You blatantly are, Mr Erstwhile Gargoyle Esquire! All those weeks of being a rock and you've gone soft," she poked him in the kidneys where, sure enough, the flesh was still soft and somewhat spongy.

"OW!"

"I rest my case,"

"Bitch!"

"Hey! Get off me!"

"You started it!"

"No, _you_ bloody well started it!"

"You-!"

"Hey!" Ben was bouncing on the spot, waving his arms in the general direction of a field. "Come on! We're gonna miss the display if you don't hurry up!"

XOXOX

Kevin was up to something; Gwen could feel it in her bones, but there was just no concrete evidence, and Steph was making it hard to watch for clues since she kept distracting him with punches.

Ben had nabbed the front bench for them, and was watching excitedly as the two guys who ran the sanctuary set up for the demonstration. He chatted eagerly with Mikey, who was changing the lens on his large, professional looking camera that Lea had lent him, trying to find the best focus.

"You see, with this one you get the better close up shots. But then, you want to have photos when they're in mid flight, _waaaaay_ over there. So you have to sacrifice and compensate. Those new Osmosian cameras…" Mikey pretended to drool. "I'd kill for one of those!"

"Kill who?" Ben said, eyed glued to the small grey bird with a short, hooked beak on the man's arm as he strode forth to begin.

"Steph, of course!" Mikey said with a flourish, suddenly leaning forward into a professional posture, camera angled expertly at the bird in question. "_Beau_tiful peregrine falcon!"

The man laughed and spoke with an accent that Gwen couldn't place, "Ah! An expert on birds of prey! Why don't you come up and take the show for me?"

"Nah," Mikey checked the screen before looking up with a cheeky grin. "I'm terrible at handling birds."

The falcon on the man's armed started shrieking loudly; it was much hoarser than an Avis cry, more raspy…it was so hard to words to it. The man laughed and walked on across the lightly raised pile of earth that served as the stage to the next row of seats at the front. "All right then! Afternoon, everyone, my name's Mark, and this is my partner Neil,"

"Hey!"

Both Gwen and Grandpa turned on their part of the bench to look at Kevin and Steph on the row behind them. Apparently, Kevin had taken Steph's camera and was trying to record the show. Grandpa made a shushing motion at them and turned back to the front.

"Quit it!" Gwen hissed.

"Gimme my camera you bastard!"

"Make me, bird breath,"

"You-!"

Gwen gave up on them and went back to listening to the introduction; it was all very interesting, and she later left the site knowing more about the biology of predatory birds than the teachers at school did. The peregrine demonstrated its hunting skills with Mark, chasing after a lure made from chicken meat while Mikey got some stunning pictures which he shared with her and Ben during the transition from Mark's falcon to Neil's jackal buzzard.

Apparently, younger falcons had lighter feathers so the adults (who were the same size) could tell them apart; the word mantling was used to describe their eating habits as they sheltered their wings around the kill and tore strips of meat from the carcass. Also, owls couldn't turn their heads around three-sixty degrees, as commonly believed; they could turn it from facing straight ahead two-seventy one way, and again in the other direction, which added up to about five hundred forty. Owls were also, contrary to popular Ancient Greek myth, very stupid, as Mark demonstrated.

After an hour of learning about birds, volunteers from the small audience were asked up to have a go at handling them, and Mikey declined politely when offered, instead throwing Gwen up at them. He got some great photos of her and the jackal buzzard, and then of Ben with the peregrine; there was a brilliant one of Steph and Kevin, stood side by side, each with a colossal European Eagle Owl on their arm. Mikey managed to catch it at a relaxed, natural moment so that Steph was looking up at one of the guys just out of the frame listening with intent, and Kevin was looking his owl straight in the disconcertingly bright orange eye. It was this one that he and Gwen talked about as they followed Ben to the gift shop after they'd thanked Mark and Neil for the demo and trudged back up the slope to the main complex.

"You're so good at this," Gwen said, flicking through the most recent pictures. "They all look great, and no one's posing or anything,"

"It's a matter of luck," Mikey said, showing her some blurred blobs that could have been anything. "I think that's Ben's head when the falcon tried to decapitate him," they both had a good giggle over the memory. "Oh well, that's why God invented the delete button…"

"Hey!" Ben was checking out an array of fridge magnets. "Look at this! Think my dad will like these?"

"Oooh!" Mikey rushed to join him, shoving the camera into Gwen's arms.

Steph bounded over and started perusing the shelves holding cuddly toys. "There aren't any cheetahs in America, fools!" she scolded the teddy in her hands, that gazed up at her balefully with black beaded eyes. "Guess it makes sense, though."

"What does?" Gwen asked, having a closer look.

"That Mark bloke lived in South Africa at one point, and probably for a long time. Didn't you hear the accent?"

Gwen blinked. She had never been good with accents of the English language beyond America…she could barely distinguish Steph's impersonations of the peoples of the British Isles, Irish and Welsh just sounded the same to her.

"It's definitely South African in some places. Take my word for it, a guy in my GCSE French class was from Jo'burg, and he _never_ lost his accent in the seven years he lived in Pompey."

Gwen shrugged. "If you insist." Then it suddenly struck her. "Where's Kevin?"

"Around," Steph shrugged grandly and scuttled off down the aisle. "Hey! Mikester, look at this!"

Mikey slid past Gwen delicately, just before they were both bowled over by Ben in his excitement.

"Me first!"

"Like hell you are!" Mikey threw himself after them.

"Careful!" Gwen snapped, grabbing a stack of jigsaw puzzles before they could topple over onto the floor.

"Look!" Steph squealed, holding up what looked like a small china bucket for inspection.

Mikey took it from her and had a closer look. He whistled long and low before grinning and tipping the thing upside down – it was then that Gwen noticed the ceramic handle on its side and realised what it was.

"That's the biggest tea mug I've ever seen,"

"Think Gerald would like one?" Steph asked, perusing the shelves for more designs. "He could use a whole tea bag in one of these bad boys, and Dyl bought him that hot plate for his desk at work so it would stay hot forever. I wonder if they have any soccer themed ones?"

Gwen held a hand out to Mikey, and he passed the mug to her. Even though she was small and slight to an almost extreme, her fist still fit inside that monster of ceramics. It had a huge cartoon sparrow slapped on the side with the cheesiest grin in the world – it was utterly _ghastly_.

"Find something slightly more meaningful than _that_ crap," Ben said, moving on now that his curiosity had been sated and now bored of them.

"Yeah…" Mikey took an exaggerated step away from Gwen. "That mug might try and eat me,"

"Aww!" Steph frowned, glaring at the mug in her hands. "Drek…"

Kevin suddenly materialised from around the corner and stood next to her. "Sup?"

"I'm thinking about getting one for Gerald, but I think this might be mildly insulting…"

"Let's have a look," Mikey leant over and stopped dead in his tracks. "Oh. Yeah…maybe not…"

Gwen squeezed her way to Steph's side to find it bore the legend 'DAD'S MUG O' TEA'. She knew Steph got on very well with her stepfather, but she'd never ventured to call him 'Dad', and it would really hurt Ian's feelings if she got it for Gerald.

"They don't usually do 'Step-Dad' merchandise," Kevin stated bluntly.

Gwen and Mikey gave him withering looks while Steph looked up at the shelves again.

"Gerald likes dogs, how about this one?" she dumped the offending mug in her hands in favour of a bright red one with smudgy black paw prints trekking across the ceramics in a random pattern.

"Garish," Mikey said.

"Interesting colour…" Gwen said diplomatically.

"I need sunglasses."

Gwen elbowed Kevin in the gut.

"Piss off, I can't think with you lot loafing around like this!"

And so they left her to it, splitting into further groups to inspect the rest of the shops wares. Gwen was tempted by the array of necklaces hanging by the entrance, but felt that the first real day of shopping wasn't the best time to blow all your money. Mikey, on the other hand, grabbed a handful of bracelets and spent the next ten minutes picking through them one by one, discarding the ones he didn't like until he was left with three. By this time Gwen was reading a book on the taxonomy of birds at the other end of the room, and she started when Mikey insisted on her opinion.

The choices were; a natural looking string and wooden bead ensemble, a sort of macramé piece threaded with a couple of brightly coloured beads (the sort that River normally wore), and a silver chain with little bird shaped charms hung round it interspersed with black glass beads.

"They all look really nice. But why is it such a big deal?" Mikey was very easily excitable, but this was really pushing it…

"It's a tradition! Sort of…" he grinned sheepishly and ran his hand through his inky black hair. "River's year started it, and she infected the rest of the sixth form when she stayed on. They went to southern France for something random and they all bought a bracelet from each town they visited. Then when Miles and Lea went on the Africa trip in their final year with her they all did the same thing. So I sort of copied the idea…"

Gwen blinked. "You didn't get any in Bellwood," she pointed out.

"Well, I considered it more of a work placement than a holiday. This is just the perfect excuse to start!"

They had a long debate about which bracelet to buy, and in the end it was none of them; Gwen found a cheap and cheerful one with chunky wooden beads in the same bright orange as his motorbike, and he fell in love with it at first sight. Steph settled on the humongous mug with the paw prints, and Ben bought a couple of fridge magnets; Gwen considered buying a bracelet, but in the end abstained, choosing to buy a jumbo packet of gummy sweets to share with the others. Once again, they lost track of Kevin as they left in a long, dispersed line with about twenty feet between them as they mooched their way back to the Rust Bucket.

"Where the hell is he?" Steph demanded, tapping her foot and making a show of checking her watch.

"Toilets," Mikey informed her, sticking his wrist in her face. "May the bracelet race begin!"

"Oh shit! I meant to start one too!" Steph spun round to purchase her own one but ran into Grandpa.

"Sorry Steph, but we've got to get back on the road."

"Dang it!" she slapped her thigh and pouted. "Better start it tomorrow…"

Mikey wriggled his wrist around so that the beads clicked together softly. "Heheh…you suck,"

Gwen was about to open her mouth and tell Mikey off when something grabbed her from behind and she was thrown into the air. She screamed, naturally, until she realised that the person slinging her over their shoulder was Kevin – then she started yelling at him.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Kevin just laughed and started sprinting away.

"What the-?" Steph started swearing and Mikey merely came out with, "Bloody hell…"

"Kevin Ethan Levin!" Gwen shouted at him, beating her fist against his shoulder blades. "Put me down this instant!"

"_Geranimo_!" he whooped, just before he jumped.

Since she had been facing the way they'd come, she didn't see the lake until they were in it. It was a real struggle to get back to shore, especially when Kevin did everything in his power to stop her by throwing his arms around her waist, laughing like and idiot and smothering her with hugs. In the end she threw up a manna shield and stalked back to the RV where the other three were laughing at her.

"SHUT UP!" she yelled, aiming a poor punch at Ben's face. He easily dodged it and leant against the side of the Rust Bucket, visibly in pain from laughing too hard.

"Uh…here," Mikey was biting his lip in an attempt to keep his mirth to himself, holding out a huge fluffy towel for her.

Gwen grabbed it and stormed inside, ignoring her grandfather's startle look and busying herself with drying her hair. The others piled in, and Kevin eventually joined them, still grinning; Steph threw the towel in his face and proceeded to try and suffocate him while hurling insults in Avis at him. Mikey sat beside Gwen quietly and took out a set of Uno cards, acting as though she wasn't still soaked to the skin, which made her feel infinitely better about life.

This little bubble of contentment burst when Kevin leant over her shoulder suddenly and kissed her cheek.

"Now we're even," he said, and strolled off to the front of the RV where Ben was sitting.

"Oh, this is _not_ over, Kevin!" Gwen jumped to her feet and ran after him in the confined space. "Get back here! I'm not done with you yet!"

It all ended, as it always did, with an argument. Involving Ben, and Steph as well, leaving poor old Mikey sitting all by himself with his Uno cards, watching them balefully.

"Doesn't anyone love me enough to play cards with me?" he whimpered like a puppy dog who'd just been smacked for no reason.

"No!" Gwen shouted at him, just as Kevin did the same.

"We're busy!"

"Can't you see we're having an argument here!"

"Don't take it out on Mikey, he didn't do anything!"

"Oh yeah? You were shamelessly flirting with him earlier – of course I'm gonna take it out of him!"

Gwen wanted to smack Kevin across the face. "Can't you take a joke?"

"It's not like _you_ care when you do that sort of thing anyway…" Ben muttered darkly.

It was hard to work out who wanted to kill Ben more, but Steph beat them too it by dragging him towards the bunks by the scruff of his neck. She threw him against the wall calmly and held his face inches from her own before she opened her mouth. "MENTION THIS AGAIN AND YOUR LIFE IS WELL AND TRULY FORFEITED BENJAMIN KIRBY!" she let him drop to the floor with a thud before dusting her hands off and walking back to the front passenger seat with a spring in her step. "Do carry on," she said brightly.

There was a moment of silence but for the engine grinding away beneath the floor, until Kevin opened his mouth.

"And another thing…"

"I'm so done with this!" Gwen snarled, turning her back on him.

"No! I say we're _not_,"

"And _I_ say piss off!"

Kevin reeled from her uncharacteristic use of bad language, and she stalked off to relieve Mikey of his loneliness. After that, everything settled down into a mellow stupor; it felt like no time at all when they'd finished eating and started to think about bed. Someone dimmed the lights, and everyone started scuttling around in readiness for sleep.

Gwen had draped herself across the back sofa seat, book falling from her hands as weariness washed over her. She yawned widely, letting the book drop to the floor with a dull thud, and curled up where she lay. The cushioned seat by her feet shifted, and then someone wedged themselves between the back of the sofa and her – a certain someone who smelled of oil, transmission fluid and leather.

"What do _you_ want?" she murmured, burying her face in her arms.

"You know I'm sorry, right?" Kevin whispered back.

"Dare say you are… But you'll just go do it again sometime."

"Like how you flirt with Mikey just to piss me off."

"Touché…"

Kevin wrapped his arms around her waist with a chuckle, and promptly fell asleep on her with a soft snore.

"Oh for the love of…!" Steph snarled from somewhere nearby. "They're basically having sex on the sofa! _Again_!"

"They're only spooning," Mikey said in an attempt to calm Steph down; Gwen could hear the wince in his voice.

"Spooning leads to forking! Isn't that what your hoody says, anyway?"

"Hey! Lea bought that for me as a _joke_, you know you shouldn't take my wardrobe too seriously. I never wear half the crap I own…"

"Just leave them," Ben added, crawling into the topmost bunk. "I don't think I'd like to anger Kevin again. I like my face the way it is,"

"Nah, I can think of better ways to improve it. Mikey?" Steph rounded on him, but he'd flopped to the floor on all fours.

"I'm all tuckered out. Rearrange it yourself, bitch."

"Bastards, the lot of you!" Steph said loudly.

"SSH!" came the united chorus of hisses.

"Sorry," she whispered into the sudden silence.

Gwen lost track after that, snuggled up as she was against Kevin's chest and the cushions. Tomorrow would be boring in that they'd be on the road for almost all of it. But still, she had her friends, her copy of _Dark Fall_, and Mikey's Uno cards; they'd find some way to stay entertained that didn't involve bloodshed…at least, that was the theory.

The very last thing Gwen remembered was a dull thud as Steph tried to climb into her bunk and hit her head on the frame.

"Ai! Iddi ou…" he swore in Avis.

"Shut up!" Ben snapped.

Steph muttered something unintelligible, of which the only phrase that could be understood was, "…for the birds…!"

XOXOX

**Yey it was longer than the first chapter! :D it was random and hopefully had some meaning to it xD**

**Anyways, I sort of have a full diary next week, and by full I mean I had to staple extra pages onto the back to get it all down, so I have no idea when I'll get time to do another update before I push of to the continent for the summer, so if I disappear from the face of the earth for weeks on end assume I've been unsuccessful in weaselling my way out of work commitment ;)**

**So yeah…I thank that's all I have to say for now xD do please drop me a review and let me know what you think! :D**

**xxx**


	3. Go Time

**AN: MASSIVELY slow update, but I've been way busier than I thought I would be xD I'll stop making promises about update dead lines because I know I'll just break them :S**

**Anways, short and random, and hoping the next one will have more meaning! But for now, its waaaaaaaay past sociable hours where I am and I'm reeeaaaaaaaly tired, so I'm going to bed xD good night all! (or good morning, wherever in the world you happen to be ;) )**

**Enjoy!**

_**Go Time**_

"Aww, I wish I'd started now," Steph said morosely, staring at Mikey's wrist.

"We've got plenty of time to outdo each other in the jewellery department," he said soothingly, tapping away at Gwen's battered old laptop. "But right now I need to upload these pictures and gloat to River and Lea,"

Gwen spun a silver fork around her fingers, exercising magic force over it and bending the metal into a rough flower shape before making it snap back into its original form. She did this over and over again; each time making the pattern more complicated and intricate, until Ben slammed a mug down in front of her.

"Hot chocolate!"

"Got any earl grey tea?" Mikey asked, tapping the space bar repeatedly. "Hey, stop it! Grah! You're not supposed to work this way, stupid computer!" he kept on hammering the different key combinations that were supposed to revive a frozen computer before giving up and whining, "Gwen! Your laptop broke…"

When she went to have a closer look, it was merely making his life difficult by failing to connect the screen to the rest of the gubbins Mikey had nearly destroyed with his tapping. And so she brought it back to life in time for the tea Ben made and the cake that Steph brought to the table.

Mikey gasped and descended upon the cardboard package with indecent enthusiasm. "Battenburg! Steph I _love_ you, you absolute angel!"

"Eww, Mikey germs!" she shrieked and ducked out of sight under the table.

"More for me," Ben said, shovelling food into his mouth.

Gwen rolled her eyes and went to pick up her book so she could have a break from magic practise, only to find it was missing. Where did it go? It had been there just now before she had fixed the laptop's screen interface…

"Something wrong?" Mikey said through a mouthful of cake.

"I'm going mad…"

"_Going_?" Steph teased.

"My book!" Gwen gestured at the vacant spot it had filled not ten minutes ago on the tabletop. "It was right here,"

"You've been bending spoons, not reading." Ben stated as though she were stupid.

"No, I was reading earlier." Gwen snapped.

Steph pounced on Ben and forced the item of cutlery into his face. "Err, s'cuse me? That's _clearly_ a fork, dumbass."

The fight was growing out of normal proportions by the time Gwen had located her missing book; Kevin was sprawled out on the sofa, nose deep in the novel he had been 'skimming' yesterday.

"Still trialling it?" she said, smiling sweetly and gracefully seating herself on his chest.

Kevin gave her one raised eyebrow and nothing else before turning back to the book.

"Eww!" Ben descended upon them and snatched the novel from his hands and held it aloft for all the world to see. "What the hell is _this_?"

"Well, Benny boy," Steph said, slipping it out of his hands and smacking him round the back of the head with it. "It's this _thing_, right? And it's called _a book_."

"Yoink!" Mikey in turn grabbed it from Steph and fell onto the seat by the table, kicking his legs up to defend himself while he lay on his back. "I wanna read this one! I was talking to a mate of mine from Havant and she said this is amazingly awesome and full of win."

"I think it's better than Twilight," Gwen smiled sweetly. "Now give me back my book,"

"I wanna look at it!" Steph whined, diving at Mikey, her long arms reaching around his defensively flailing legs.

"Hey!"

"Haha!"

Steph shrieked when Kevin threw his shoe, hitting her in the face. "_I_ was reading it. Hand it over, Steph."

"Die you bastard,"

"Bring it, bitch!"

"All right then!"

Gwen managed to salvage her book from the fight and sat down to read. Mikey sat next to her, playing solitaire and humming a tune she was sure came from one of the Harry Potter films. Presently, Kevin sat down opposite them, leaving Steph and Ben to their own devices, and kicked Mikey under the table.

"Oh, sorry!" Mikey gushed, making a mountain out of a molehill. "Did I offend you somehow? I'm so terribly sorry!"

"That's Dumbledore's Army," Kevin nodded at his tune.

"Yeah," Mikey grinned. "It's my favourite piece of music from _Order of The Phoenix_."

Gwen had to roll her eyes as the two boys launched into an in-depth discussion about the world of Harry Potter, and eventually she gave up on reading so she could listen to them talk.

"There is actually a sort of spell like a Patronus," Mikey said in a far away voice. "River mentioned it this one time…I think it was back when they were still in sixth form,"

"Yeah," Gwen chipped in, thinking deeply as she fetched her spell book from her pocket. "It doesn't work by itself, though. You need the right artefacts."

"Like a wand?" Kevin teased, laughing at her scowl.

"No," Mikey frowned as he tried to think. "Oh God, what _was_ it?"

"You need a protection charm," Gwen read out of her book. "It's a _bit_ like a wand, but it's more like a really short staff. And you need a gemstone,"

"How does that work?" Kevin asked, completely lost.

Mikey turned in his seat to face Gwen, still frowning. "Isn't it something like…you take the staff as the medium of control, and the energy resonance in the crystal you're holding powers it?"

"Yeah, but you need the right spell," Gwen showed him. "It's not always an animal that appears, though. Some people have a protective shield that's a plant or an element,"

"What, like iron?" Kevin blurted out.

"Like wind and rain, or a tsunami," Gwen explained.

"Oh,"

"Tee hee!" they both looked at Mikey as he giggled. "Bet you mine would be a slug or something!"

"Or a hurricane," Gwen said dryly.

"What about you two?" Mikey asked eagerly. "What do you think you'd be? And I'm talking strictly about in the world of J K Rowling, here!"

"What, a Patronus?" Gwen asked before stopping to think. "A raven," she grinned.

"Hey, just cause you'd be in Ravenclaw," Mikey teased, mussing her hair up. "No one likes a show off, Gwen! We all know you have brains the size of Jupiter, you don't need to show off! Hey, Kevin, what about you?"

"All right…" Gwen said grudgingly as Kevin considered this. "A bird of _some _description…"

"How cool would it be if your Patronus was an earth worm?" Mikey grinned.

Gwen smacked him with her book, laughing.

"A lion or a dragon!" Kevin said at last.

"Ha!" Mikey pointed and laughed harder than ever. "Not a lion, no way, not _you_!" he said playfully.

"Dragon, maybe," Gwen added.

"Breath like one," Mikey winked at her, and they both laughed.

"Hey!"

"Sorry, I couldn't resist! You just walked into that, how could I not take the piss?"

"What about you, Mikey?" Gwen asked.

"A snail." He said with a straight face.

"Seriously," Gwen demanded, raising her book in demonstration that she meant business.

"Okay, okay!" Mikey laughed. "A rabbit, maybe. Either that or an otter or a dolphin,"

"Isn't the otter your totem?" Kevin frowned.

"Yeah, kinda…but that's on North American culture, right? Harry Potter is on English symbolism and values. Besides, Hermione's an otter, and I'm _nothing_ like her!"

Gwen had a silly image in hr head of Mikey wearing billowing black robes with red and gold trimmings, waving a wand and shooting a smoky grey rabbit into the air.

"I think I'd look _good_ in a Hogwarts uniform, know what I mean?" Mikey smirked, before giving in to his urge to laugh. "Ha! Oh Gwen, you should have seen your face when I said that! Heehee…"

"Imagine Ben casting a Patronus," Kevin snorted. "It'd be a wide mouthed tree frog!" the two boys roared with laughter.

"It actually would be as well!" Mikey gasped for air. "I can see it now…!"

Ben joined them at the table, and looked confused when all three started laughing at him. "Did I miss something?"

"I'd be a Phoenix!" Steph yelled, sliding in beside Kevin. "I'm actually Albus Dumbledore, see? I just shaved my impressive beard, had a nose job, and wear contacts now."

They all fell about laughing, and Kevin cut in to say, in between bouts of laughter, "You got the eyes for it at least!"

"I know! Right?" she grinned, giving him the thumbs up.

"I know a _great_ game!" Mikey began, but Steph kicked him under the table. "Ouch!"

"I got there first, it's _my_ game,"

"What, the 'name your character' game?" Ben asked.

"Duh," Kevin drawled.

"Okay, okay!" Mikey said excitedly. He pointed at Kevin and Gwen and said, "Lily and James Potter!"

"Hey!" Kevin snapped. "Why do _I_ have to die before the book even starts?"

"Do I _really_ look that much like her?" Gwen groaned. She had been told at school when they prepared for fancy dress charity days that she should come dressed as Ginny Weasley.

"Yup, 'fraid so," Mikey grinned. "Right, so then Steph is,"

"I'm Dumbledore I'm Dumbledore I'm Dumbledore!" Steph literally bounced in her seat.

"Why?" Kevin turned on her. "You die and fall off a tower and go _splat!_ on the ground! Why'd you want _that_?"

"Cause Dumbledore is a mysterious and misleading character who is reconciled at the very end of the last book and is a much loved member of the books characters. And because," she leant over so she was in his face, fluttering her eyelashes with a wicked grin. "I have his eyes," she finished dreamily.

"So then," Mikey went on. "Ben can be-"

"Hi!" Ben stood up and flourished the fork in his hands like a wand. "I'm Harry Potter, and I like bothering Snape!" the others were already rolling with laughter, even before he yelled, "_Expelliarmus!_" and Steph reached up with a lazy flick of her wrist and propelled the utensil from his hand across the floor with a loud clatter.

"Not so macho now, _are_ you?" Steph cackled with glee.

"Oh dear," Mikey drawled in a wavering voice that made them all stop and stare at him. "We _are_ in trouble,"

"That has to be the best Flich impression I've ever heard _ever_," Ben told him.

"You ain't seen nothing," Steph grinned, and poked Mikey's arm. "Go on, do your Snape impression!"

"But thingy in the film is always so _deadpan_," Mikey complained loudly. "It sucks! And I can't do the Stephen Fry impression from the book because it makes me sound like I'm constipated,"

"Nice," Gwen said lightly, trying not to laugh at the look on Kevin's face that was torn between amusement and disbelief.

"Okay, do Alan Rickman then!" Ben goaded.

"Yeah, you know the whole speech off by heart," Steph whined. "And you're so _good _at it, Mikey!"

"Alright," he sighed. "If it'll shut you up, then…" he sat up straighter, before leaning forward and combing his inky black hair into a smooth mop that didn't suit him at all. He sat up slowly, regarding them all with disdain, before clearing his throat and beginning.

Gwen was taken aback at how much he actually _sounded_ like the Snape in the movie. He went through the whole speech, word perfect with every dramatic pause drawn out just long enough to make it realistic.

"Well, well, well. Mr _Potter_. Our new celebrity," he sneered at them, and a chill ran down Gwen's spine at the sight of his usually cheerful and pleasant face twisted into such a convincing, scornful mask.

"Brilliant!" Ben grinned. "I actually believed you there for a moment!"

"You could be an actor," Kevin said thoughtfully.

"He'd great, isn't he? Hey, hey! Mikster!"

"What _now_?" he groaned, mussing his hair up into its usual inky like spray.

Steph drummed her finger nails very deliberately against the table top and hummed a syncopated version of the Harry Potter tune. Mikey caught on very quickly with a grin, and it took Gwen a moment to figure out what they were up to until he murmured in a _terrible_ American accent, "Kinda…catchy.

"Snape, Snape. Serverus Snape,"

"Oh." Ben said as Mikey continued with the mantra, and Steph bounced in time in her seat, grinning from ear to ear. "My. _God_."

"Snape, Snape. Serverus Snape-"

"DUMBLEDORE!" Steph screeched, making Gwen jump.

"Hey," Steph managed to say even though she was still giggling. "We should do our own version of that when we get home!"

"Why not do it now?" Ben hedged. "That would be hilarious!"

Kevin looked less and less keen about it, and Steph howled with laughter at his expression.

"Not enough people," Mikey said. "Unless you have any glove puppets…?"

"I got socks," Ben said dubiously.

"Lets have a look!"

XOXOX

Kevin couldn't believe what he was watching the others do, but Gwen seemed to be enjoying herself immensely, so he let Steph bully him into being the cameraman. On the understanding that he would break her nose if she got him on screen, of course.

"Okay, ready guys?" Mikey exclaimed, all four of them squashed into the space underneath the table, their arms at awkward angles as they tried to raise the hands that were inside the socks they had taken from their bags.

"Ready as we'll ever be," Gwen said, picking lint from 'Hermione's' nose and readjusting the substitute hair that lay like a bottlebrush over the puppets 'head'.

"Okay Mikey, you start,"

"Wait! We forgot the ticking noise!" Ben moaned.

"Aw _shit_!" Steph punched the floor in frustration. "And I was having so much _fun_ doing this!" she whined. Turning he big, blue, watery eyes at Kevin, she sniffed and her bottom lip wobbled.

"Not a chance in hell."

"Please?" she pleaded with him. "Just this once? I'll be your friend for life!"

"I _am_ your friend for life," he snarled.

"You don't love me anymore!" Steph cried.

"Nope," Kevin agreed.

"Oh," Steph snarled at him. "I hate you, you bitch!"

"Aw, Kevin!" Mikey wheedled. "Just this once? One shot, mate, and we'll let you go, promise!"

Sighing, Kevin grabbed the fork and held it under the table, poised to tap it against the plastic. "_Once_." He said menacingly.

In hindsight, he should have known it wouldn't be one take; they spent two hours trying to get it right, because someone was out of time, or got the words wrong, or Gwen started laughing and the Steph and Ben started hitting each other – which was a feat in itself for Steph since she had Dumbledore _and_ Ron.

It was fun, to say the least – especially because Kevin could insult them all without fear of retaliation since they were squeezed into a tight space and couldn't get out easily.

They stopped around lunchtime to eat and laugh about how stupid the whole thing was. At least, Kevin did, while Steph pointed at Ben and Mikey, sniggering loudly.

"Snape!" Mikey yelled at Ben, who head banged back at him.

"Harry!"

They went on for a bit longer than the original spoof, but the Steph jumped in between them, elbows finding their eye sockets and pushing them out of the way.

"DUMBLEDORE!" she shouted, arms thrown out dramatically, legs spaced far apart, knees bent, with a manic gleam in her eyes.

"Glad you kept your clothes on," Kevin sneered.

Steph fixed him with a pointed look, before she grinned widely and began to slowly work the hem of her tank tom further up her torso until Kevin ran to the end of the RV, screaming, "My mind is unclean!"

"Ha! You should have seen the look on your face!" she guffawed.

"Hey Steph," Mikey ran up and bumped his hip against hers – at least, he attempted to, since she was so much taller than him and he only got her thigh. "Havant Strip Tease!" and then they were both pretending to peel their clothes off in an OTT manner, while Kevin cowered in a corner, trying to cleanse his mind of the mental image he _never_ wanted to see _ever_.

When Gwen came to sit beside him, he groaned, "Make it stop!"

"You know what they're like," she said soothingly, but Kevin didn't want to be consoled – he wanted to scream and throw something at Steph.

"You know, I don't see what all the fuss is about," Ben said languidly, leaning against the wall as the RV rolled to a stop. "I mean," he flashed them both a wicked grin before he went on. "We all know you wish Gwen would give you a strip tease!"

Kevin was about to pound Ben into the ground _beneath_ the Rust Bucket – floor of the vehicle be damned – when something bright pink and hot flashed past his face, making him blink and recoil from the heat. Once he had regained himself, he found that Ben was no longer standing by the wall, and Gwen was no longer sitting beside him.

Mikey was sprawled on the floor, and Steph was picking herself up from her perch by the table, staring at the open door in alarm.

"Jesus Christ! She's _really_ pissed off," Steph said in awe, while Mikey rolled onto his side, making a show of dragging himself off the floor while muttering "What the _f_-?"

Steph kicked him and he said, "-lip!"

Kevin got up slowly, walked to the door, and sat down on the top step to watch Gwen kill her cousin.

"Hehe," Steph giggled, squeezing herself into the gap between Kevin and the lintel, and pointing at Ben, who was screaming that he would kill Albedo. "Look at'im go!"

"Bloody hell…" Mikey said, leaning against Steph's shoulder to get a better look. "How do you _do_ it, Kevin? I mean, I love Gwen like the little sister I never had and all, but dating her's got to be like living with a time bomb! I wouldn't have the guts to do it for fear of getting strung up by my small intestines in a conveniently placed tree,"

"That's what makes life interesting," Kevin agreed, watching Gwen as she conjured a shield in front of Ben so he ran head long into it, before yelling at him and punching him in the shoulder. "I never know which version Gwen I'm gonna get each morning."

"What's so special about that?" Steph demanded, waving a hand at them. "We've all hit Ben before, so what? You'd be crazy if you didn't feel the urge to do so every so often." Clearly, she hadn't heard his heart felt admission.

"What, like this?" Kevin punched her arm, and she retaliated with twice the force. "Spack," he grinned.

"Bitch." She slapped him round the face.

"Slag,"

"Bastard,"

"Whore,"

"Prat,"

Kevin used a word he wouldn't dare use around his mother or sister, and Steph's eyes glittered.

"Oh, it's go time-!" she used another nasty word to describe him, and they were off on their slagging match.

Kevin was only dimly aware of Mikey walking away before coming back a couple of minutes later with a Mars Bar in his hand, climbing past them so he could sit on the ground outside in the fresh air and look on in amusement.

XOXOX

Come late afternoon, when the stalls along side the reservation they had stopped in to get more fuel were starting to pack up for the day, Mikey and Gwen walked away from the smiling old lady with crinkles round her eyes and a huge collection of necklaces and other jewellery to offer, each with new articles of decoration.

Gwen had a beautiful necklace of glass beads and die cast metal animals; three humming birds, a bear and an eagle. As well as this, she had a wooden bead bracelet with tiny, intricate salmon carved into the beads around wavy lines depicting the sea, and small circles that the woman had told her were the salmon eggs – a symbol of rebirth and prosperity.

Mikey had a green bead bracelet with leaves carved into the wood, and a simple metal pendant of a bear paw hung on a leather thong. There was a small carving of the outline of a bear, with a zigzag line through the middle that had an arrowhead at the end – something called a Zuni bear. Mikey barely understood it either, and Gwen was sure River would know something about it when they arrived in BC.

Now that Ben was sulking over his defeat at her head in the RV, and she and Mikey had spent a happy half hour discussing jewellery, Gwen was feeling very good about life.

Mikey was laughing over a joke she had just made, and turned to her to come up with a really witty line when Steph sprang out of nowhere and slammed something on her wrist into his face.

"HA!" she yelled and cackled like a hyaena. "You see? You see? I have a better bracelet than you!" she drew back enough to allow them to see the beautiful craftsmanship that had been poured into the making of the bracelet; it was made of metal charms and glass beads, all shaped like different types of leaves, and all in different colours. "See why? Because!" Steph trilled, pointing and laughing at Mikey's stunned expression. "Because because _because_! It's metal, _and_ its glass, and it echoes the _Colours of The Wind_ from Disney's _Pocahontas_! Therefore, I am still in touch with my inner child, and not trying to grow up so fast by wearing a Zuni bear to guide and protect me during my excursions in life! Ergo," she thumped her fist over her heart. "I win!"

"Pfft!" Kevin walked past, also wearing a new bracelet – something like a friendship bracelet you can buy at most street markets made from strands of embroidery thread – in every shade of warm, earthy brown you could imagine. "That's not what Zuni bear's are for, you doofus!"

"Oh," Mikey scowled at Steph's back as she bowled after Kevin. It's go time Steph! GWEN!" she grabbed her wrist and frog marched her back towards the stalls. "We have some hunting to do!"

"Does this _really_ have to be a competition?" Gwen complained, allowing him to direct their new witch-hunt for pretty beads. "Isn't buying bracelets like this supposed to be about growing and maturing as a person? And serve as a marker for where you've been and what you've done in life?"

"Gwen, Gwen," Mikey waved her questions away. "Of course it's all that! But when Steph's thrown into the mix, it becomes a contest to see who can find the shiniest bracelet!" he dived into a barrel and started sifting. "So stop being all analytical and miss boffin brains and help me look!"

Gwen sighed, and left him to his own devices. She was sure he'd find her back in the Rust Bucket with her book sooner or later when he realised she wasn't there anymore…

XOXOX

And now, without further adue, I'm going to bed xD

**Reviews are well met and generate virtual hugs and cookies to the one who leaves them! ;)**

**xxx**


	4. Aquarium

**AN: Hello everyone I'm back again! xD**

**Bloody hell :S I haven't updated since last summer, I feel ashamed of myself… to be honest, a lot of things did get in the way; it was just one disaster after another and everything that could go wrong did, so I haven't given any of my stories much thought.**

**I would like to give a special thanks to **Mastress Tessa **who dropped me a review last week while I was struggling to find inspiration :) cheesy as this may sound, your message made me smile and gave me the motivation to finish this chapter so quickly! Thanks a bunch, I really needed that :D you can have a life times supply of any flavoured virtual cookie you like and a MASSIVE hug!**

**So yeah, updates will be patchy, but I'll make a concerted effort to keep them coming. And once again, sorry for the long absence I have taken! I promise the next time if I take my leave I'll try to make it much shorter ;)**

**Well, here's my cobbled update, hope you enjoy the randomness :P**

_**Aquarium**_

"Wheeeee!" Mikey shrieked, running up the huge sweeping staircase. "Look it, Steph! It's La Rochelle all over again! Whoo I hope the church is as impressive as Rouen!"

Kevin gave Steph a raised eyebrow, and she tried to hide herself in the hedge they were walking past.

"Please…don't ask…the memories, they're…they're just too painful."

"What's all the fuss about?" Ben demanded, watching Mikey run back down the steps, grab Gwen and bodily lift her from the ground before running up them again, cackling like a madman.

Steph sighed deeply – dragging the moment out until Kevin elbowed her in the gut. She gave him a filthy look before rounding on Ben.

"For you _information_, dipshit," she snarled. "There was an extra circular course trip for people doing languages at our school. _I_ ended up in _his_ group-!"

"Wait," Ben raised a hand to stop her. "You were five years ahead of where you should have been! What the hell?"

Steph smacked him in the mouth. "Shut up I'm not done bitching! Anyways, so we stay in this place in Rouen and we took a side trip to La Rochelle for bloody hours and hours and we went to this aquarium that's apparently world renowned, and I almost got raped by the fat git who was following my group bloody _everywhere_!" she flapped her arms like a windmill to emphasise her point. "And Kevin bloody McIntyre tried to slip the bastard my number! The prick!"

The boys exchanged looks with raised eyebrows. Then, Ben patted her soothingly on the arm. "Well, if anyone tries it on with you here _our_ Kevin will beat the shit out of him – right after I've eaten his soul. Right Kevin?" he grinned up at the older boy.

Kevin just stared at his hopeful face for a moment, unfolded his arms, and walked away without a word.

"Yeah, I'm so going to find the worst washed up slapper I can!" Steph yelled after him. "And I'm gonna give her _your_ number! Try explaining that one to Gwen!"

Of course, Kevin couldn't care less; he knew Steph would forget about it once they found the shark tank. Just outside the main entrance, Mikey was bouncing off the walls and the ceiling of the over hang, and off poor Gwen. Wordlessly, he grabbed her hand and pulled her inside before the others caught up.

"By the way," he said once they were indoors and mostly alone. "If I start getting weird texts from some skank, hit Steph for me will you?"

Gwen hit her head with the heel of her palm. "Do I _want_ to know?" she growled.

"Probably not." He said honestly.

It wasn't long before the others arrived, flanked by Max who bought the tickets, and tried to convince the arrogant looking guy who couldn't be much older than them behind the desk that Mikey was a student.

"'Ang on," he said in a drawling accent that sound like Steph's when she was sleepy.

"Jesus, laying the Pompey accent on thick," Steph muttered darkly. Then to Kevin, so that the guy couldn't hear it, "He only does that when he's hacked off with someone."

"So when does he start with the Irish accent?" Kevin asked. He _had_ been born there after all; whether it was Northern Ireland or Southern Ireland, he didn't know. Mikey had explained the complexities of the United Kingdom to him on numerous occasions, and Kevin hadn't paid attention long enough for it to sink into his memory.

"Oh no," Steph said simply. "Only when he's drunk. And since my mom's been looking after him she told Uncle Max that neither of us are to have alcohol at all while under his supervision."

"But you don't get drunk!" Kevin said indignantly.

"Yeah, but apparently," she put on a sneering, simpering voice. "It's not fair if I get to drink and Mikey-wikey doesn't!"

"Finally!" Mikey stalked past, shoving them out of the way as he stuffed his driving licence into his pocket. "I'ma gonna go kill the nearest living thing now before I explode…"

"Oh dear," Steph blinked, staring after him. "He doesn't normally get this pissed off. Wonder what crater face over there said to him." She jerked her thumb in the direction of the desk, where Max was looking less than impressed too.

"Jerk," Ben muttered, stalking past with Gwen. "I'm not ten years old!" he rounded on Steph and Kevin. "Do I look ten years old?"

Kevin expected Steph to tell him that he did, but instead she stuffed her fist into her mouth, giggled, and ran away before she started howling with laughter by the doors to the entrance.

Taking pity on Ben, Kevin slapped him on the back so that his knees buckled and followed Steph at a more sedate pace. "You know what? I'm gonna save you the embarrassment of answering that question and just move on with life."

It took a moment, but it sunk in.

"Hey, wait a minute…! Kevin! Get back here!"

Kevin thrust Mikey into Ben's path to slow him down and pushed his way into the first leg of the exhibit, cackling as he ran. Steph pelted after him, and by the end of the first ten minutes they'd both calmed down enough to notice the fish around them.

Mikey, after getting over his sulk, came into his own; wielding his camera like a professional, and managing to get some brilliant pictures of the tanks and their occupants, even though he had to spend five minutes changing the settings for each tank to get 'the right effect'. Whatever _that_ meant.

The whole aquarium was supposed to take about three hours, and considering how slowly they were going – in between fights, photos and piss taking the names on the placards – they would probably spend an extra half hour in there at least. So, while Mikey and Ben compared notes on camera technique and took sneak shots of the others when they least expected it, Steph tailed after Kevin and Gwen as they looked at the fish, and made random remarks that had them both in stitches.

"Well that's just lame!" Kevin stabbed a finger at a plaque denoting the name of the fish in an open air tank about five feet high to deter people from sticking their hands in the water. "_Common_ Ray. Can't they think of anything more interesting or original?"

Gwen shrugged, ignoring his outrage, and began reading the section below the phrase Kevin had been ranting about.

"What are you doing?" he demanded. "That's not even written in English,"

"I'm practising my French," she said simply, and Kevin rolled his eyes.

"Hey look," Steph punched him on the arm before tapping the side of the tank, indicating a ray that suddenly started floating vertically and performing a variant of the waltz. "Dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner Bat Man!"

Gwen put a hand over her mouth to stifle her laugh, and Kevin bit down on his tongue, but Steph turned her bright smile on them both and repeated her mantra, this time incorporating a dance to go with it.

"Dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner _Bat Man_!"

Gwen had to turn away, shaking with laughter, and stagger towards Mikey who had whipped his camera out again to record this moment in time.

And as if that wasn't enough, Steph just had to go another round.

"Dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner dinner – hey!"

"Shut _up_!" Kevin tackled her against the wall.

The shark tank was even worse; Steph crept up behind him and Ben, humming the theme to _Jaws_, right before she pounced and sent them all sprawling on the floor. Luckily, Ben took up the chase so that Kevin could stand around and watch the freaky looking shark with _huge_ lopsided teeth that stuck out at every angle float lazily by, looking all menacing and evil.

"So," Gwen said, sliding up beside him and taking his hand.

Mikey pitched up too with his camera and a spark in his eye like the one in Crystal's on Christmas Day. "Cool!" he squealed, checking the focus. "_Here_ sharky sharky!"

"So what?" Kevin asked, and immediately wished he hadn't. Gwen had that self-assured smirk on her face that told him she was angling to wind him up. And he'd just gone and played straight into her hands.

"Remember that report you had to hand in at school?" she said innocently, smiling like a Cheshire cat.

"Nope." He looked up to watch another shark block out the lights from above. "I get handed so many that I don't do, I just lose count after three."

"Uno. Dos. Tres. Quatro…" Mikey said with a laugh. When Gwen and Kevin stared at him he chuckled nervously and said, "I can count to four in several major earth languages. That joke sounded way funnier in my head…"

Turning back to the topic at hand, Kevin squeezed Gwen's hand expectantly, and huffed in annoyance when she didn't respond. In fact, she seemed very disinterested in everything until they came to a large room that resembled a green house, and she and Mikey went ballistic.

There was a large tank that snaked its way around the room, under and over the bridges and walkways you could follow, and inside this river with its planted pondweed and artificial currents, frolicked about a dozen sea otters.

Needless to say, Mikey was all over them like flies on a bin, and Gwen followed him at a more sedate pace, giggling non-stop.

"What's so great about them anyway?" Kevin complained loudly, making a few passers-by stop and stare.

"Hee hee," Steph giggled, watching Mikey zoom around the room with his camera. "Look at'im go!"

"Isn't it his totem or something?" Ben asked as he walked past, bending down to look at an otter that was spinning round on its back and watching him curiously.

"Meh," Kevin shrugged and just followed the crowd; it wasn't like he could to anything else…

The final part of the part of the aquarium incorporated several species of tortoises, an open-air turtle pool, and a large tank containing an enormous crocodile. Mikey started reciting something about a crocodile, that was apparently enormous; Kevin didn't pay much attention until the final line of, "…Into the sun and sizzled like a sausage!"

Steph was actually on her knees and laughing so hard she couldn't make any noise, right before Ben looked down at her on the ground, then checked both ways to make sure no one was looking, and kicked her knee out from under her so that she was sprawled on the floor, still unable to make her laugh heard, and stole her rucksack.

"Score!" he bounced to his feet with the intention of running away, while Steph pointed at him with ire in her eyes and the inability to speak.

Kevin tackled him against the wall before he'd gone three paces. "_No_ one," he snarled, whacking Ben round the back of the head and snatching the rucksack from his hands. "Mugs my best friend but _me_!"

"Ouch!" Ben twisted out of his grasp and ran to hide behind Mikey, giving Kevin a furtive look. "No need to get violent!"

Nodding to himself, Kevin slung the bag over his shoulders and began to walk away sedately, whistling to himself. Steph, having managed to master her lungs again, jumped out of nowhere like a fiery ninja and grabbed at his arm.

"Gimme my rucksack, bitch!"

They had a five-minute tussle over the thing, until it lay abandoned in the middle of the walkway as they chased each other around the crocodile tank, swearing in various broken bits of alien languages that River would have clouted them for had she been present. Eventually, however, Gwen managed to pull them apart and kick them into the gift shop at the end, with Mikey trailing behind and Steph's rucksack slung over his shoulder. Ben followed cautiously, and sadly Kevin noticed this; he and Steph scented the weakness and set out to ambush him, purely because he was 'setting himself up as a target'.

At least, that's what they told Max when they nearly collapsed a shelving unit on themselves.

"Wow," Mikey stared at the packet of bright blue gummy dolphin sweets in his hands, counting something on the back out on his fingers. "Jesus titty-!" he began, but broke off as a woman shuffled past, wide eyed and wearing a crucifix plainly round her neck.

"Watch your mouth," Steph whacked him good-naturedly round the shoulder. "Some people take their faith _seriously_ round here, even if we're just filthy, _filthy_ heathens."

"Yeah, right." He said impatiently. "But _look_!" he brandished the packet for her inspection, and Kevin leant over for a closer look too. "I think this breaks our record."

Steph swore loudly, earning frowns from the people around them and a hearty laugh from Kevin and Ben.

"I…I don't believe it." Steph declared, flinging the packet back onto the shelf. "I won't believe it. Mel will hear about _this_!" and she flounced off with her phone in her hand.

"Heh," Mikey laughed, and explained the back-story to his bewildered companions. "River and Miley started this game of who can find the most E Numbers in various sweets. Err," he added to their blank stares. "E Numbers are additives – it's a coding thing the EU uses to keep track of what substances are put into food. The most Riv ever found was twenty-five in this marshmallow snowman thing. I just found thirty-two," he showed them, and Ben turned away proclaiming he felt sick.

"Why'd you put that crap into your system anyway?" Kevin demanded while Mikey carefully photographed the ingredients, giggling. "I'd rather eat out of a garbage can,"

Mikey gave a short bark of laughter. "Probably do you more good, to be honest. Give your immune system something to chew over, at any rate! This stuff screws your hormone levels and can give you cancer. Apparently. Any way, we come from a firm background of not putting synthetic crap into your stomach. Steph's metabolism can handle most Earth foods, but her mum won't let her eat them out of principle. Sucks to be her," they both grinned evilly as they advanced through the shop.

Steph was all but spitting blood at Gwen over the blue dolphins, who attached herself to Mikey the moment he arrived, and they swanned off to look at photography books.

"I don't believe it!" Steph insisted to Kevin, following him past a barrel of stuffed lobsters in obnoxious pink and neon purple. "I _don't_ be_lieve_ it!"

"So you keep saying." Kevin said in a bored tone, snatching at a large and sparkly dolphin, complete with sequins. _Maybe Crystal would like this…_

"What the hell, Kevin? You're looking at stuffed animals! You thinking about dissecting it or using it for target practise? Please say yes!"

Kevin raised an eyebrow at her expression. "No." he cut her down with as fewer syllables as possible. "For my sister."

Steph's expression went from comical shock, to abject horror, before settling into deep suspicion. Pointing an accusing finger at him, she slid away, eyes glowing with the promise of retribution. "I don't trust you," she hissed, darting behind a bookshelf, making a show of watching him from afar.

Kevin told her to do something rather unsanitary, in what little Osmosian he knew, and went back to prowling the stuffed toy section. Ben looked horrified when he saw this, and then intensely curious, until finally he offered some of the best advise Kevin had ever heard from him, and ended up helping to select the most perfect cuddly toy for Crystal in the _world_.

XOXOX

"Dude. Seriously?" Mikey looked just about ready to smack Steph.

She was glaring at Kevin from across the RV, waiting for the kettle to boil and shuffling a set of well-worn Uno cards. If looks could kill they would have died by now and gone to hell for the souvenirs, and come back again to be smited once more.

"It's an iridescent octopus." He told her impatiently. "And shuffle those bloody cards!"

"It's betrayal, _that's_ what it is." Steph growled mutinously.

Kevin wasn't paying any attention. Kevin Levin was, in fact, reading Gwen's copy of _Dark Fall_. She had yet to notice, and so had Ben in actual fact; it was going to be funny when they did. Mikey could only imagine the taunts Ben and Steph could come up with.

It wasn't long that he was brooding over this, since Steph decided she would deal out the cards at that moment and hit him in the face with three black cards (two colour changes and a plus four card).

The game didn't last long, since Gwen gave up fairly quickly after the first argument, and Ben ended up with more than half the deck after five minutes. It was then they split off into groups, or rather into pairs or loners; Steph crawled into her bunk muttering about traitors, Gwen went to sit up front with Max, Kevin went to the back seat and left Mikey with Ben.

They had fun playing Sumo Slammers and eating the sweets they had bought at the aquarium, and then started baiting Steph because it was far more interesting. The end came just before they stopped to eat dinner, when out of no where Gwen punched them both so hard in the stomach that even Kevin was surprised by the extent of her fury. Apparently, she took offence to the idea of beating each other up, and being a pain in the neck all day long.

"You thought the otter dance was funny!" Mikey reminded her loudly, helping to cook the pasta. "Admit it, you were laughing!" He yelped when she turned on him with a spatula.

"Ever been beaten up by a girl?" she hissed.

"Yes!" Mikey squeaked, fearing for his life. "Several times. By their merit and my cowardice, and not my gentlemanliness."

"Ever been beat up by a _glowing girl_?" she menaced, poking him hard in the chest with her weapon.

"No and I don't plan to provoke her!" he pleaded, diving for the table and pushing Kevin out of the way so he could hide beneath a comic book Ben had left lying around.

Kevin gave her the biggest grin Mikey had seen yet, and proclaimed, "And that's why she's my girl!"

"Why, because no one else is mad enough to cross her?" Ben teased.

Steph just glowered at the proceedings.

Mikey sighed, and later accepted Gwen's hug of apology, and promised her he was going to behave himself. Naturally, this didn't last long since the next morning Steph got over her sulk and started pulling pranks on everyone, and Mikey had to retaliate in order to survive. He had to explain this to her after she got a face full of icy water when he ducked out of Steph's firing line. It wasn't a pleasant morning for anyone, not after Kevin got involved in defending his girlfriend's honour…

When it became apparent that Max was losing his patience with them, everyone became quiet and subdued, choosing to sit in a circle under a tree by the car park they had stopped at to eat their ham and cheese toasties in silence.

"Well," Steph said finally, watching a family with four young children amble past in disarray. "This is fun."

"Remember when we used to be like that?" Mikey asked, spinning the cap of his water bottle between his fingers, nodding at the laughing, shrieking children.

"_Used_ to be?" she retorted flatly.

Ben sniggered, then coughed, before finally choking on his toastie. Kevin thumped him hard on the back, and Ben smiled weakly as he croaked, "Thanks,"

"No problem!" Kevin enthused. "Any excuse to hit you,"

"Moving swiftly along from that dangerous topic," Mikey began, but Steph started laughing so he frowned at her instead. "What now?"

"You sounded like George Alagiah doing the evening news."

"Alibaba who?" Kevin questioned.

"_George_," Steph said scathingly. "Alagiah. Only one of the best news presenters the BBC has to offer. You filthy American heathen,"

"Hang on, hang on!" Ben jumped in before Mikey could stop him. "You live on _our_ soil, eat _our_ food, and then you turn round and say-!"

"Drop it mate," Mikey sighed. "It isn't worth it…"

"Yeah, ya heathen!" Steph had the bright-eyed look of a person on a mission to annoy.

"I hear things about the BBC," Gwen said as Ben and Steph started bickering loudly. "Not always good…what do _you_ think as a Brit?"

Mikey shrugged. "I knew someone who did one of those competition things for kids, and her friends all reckon it was rigged in favour of the other contestants cause she was the only private school kid in her set, and the other person who got kicked out at the beginning was a private brat as well. And when I say brat, I mean he was an actual arrogant plonker."

"Hmm," Kevin seemed to be considering something. "I heard Mel say something about them," he said in ominous undertones, and Mikey nodded.

Mel's words were always full of wisdom, albeit cryptically so…

"But," Mikey was determined to highlight the good points of his favourite TV Company. "The BBC _is_ very reliable most of the time. My dad watches it to keep up to date with the world – its got one of the best networks of journalists, correspondents and TV crews in the world! At least," he gave them a sheepish look. "_I_ think they do."

"Yeah," Steph said scathingly, breaking away from her arm wrestle match with Ben. "It's reliable and stuff for current affairs, but not when you want a weather report." She put on her best, raucous, Pompey accent and waved a fist at the sky. "Slight chance of snow in north-westerly areas – my _arse_ Carol Kirkwood!"

Mikey looked out across the arid grasslands around them, reminded of Africa where he had only seen snow at the top of mountains – a far cry from his beloved United Kingdom. He placed his hands over his heart and sighed with such delight and wonder at the memories he held close to his heart. "It was like Armageddon hosted by Frosty the Snowman. It was _epic_!"

"It was false advertisement!" Steph spat.

"What?" Mikey demanded. "So the BBC now run adverts for snow clouds? No _wonder_ the UK's gone to the dogs! And there I was thinking it was the politicians' fault, when all along it was the BBC and their prejudiced agenda against certain cloud formations!"

The irony of their following row was lost on the others; truth be told, the only person who would have fully understood it was Miley – even River would not have been able to appreciate the humour of it because she had not been there at the science museum in London when it all started.

After a few more bites of toastie, and a couple more arm wrestles, they all got up to stretch and trudged back towards the RV. Mikey was resigning himself to the fate of another rousing round of physical and verbal abuse from all sides directed at every target, but Gwen calmly pulled out her laptop, plugged it into the wall socket, and pulled out a large file folder full of DVDs.

"Wow!" Ben said excitedly, pushing Mikey out of the way.

"Sweet!" Mikey crowed, jumping onto his back and leaning over his shoulder so that they both sank to the ground. "I call _Monty Python_!"

"Seconded!" Steph and Kevin shouted together.

"I seconded it," Kevin snapped at her.

"No, you thirded it bitch, I got there first!"

"Can I fourth it then?" Ben asked glumly as he and Mikey settled into the prime seats on one side of the table.

Gwen set the laptop up where it would be at the right distance to watch without screwing their eyes up. She made to sit down beside Mikey but Kevin planted himself there instead and pulled her onto his lap.

"Hey you slag, what about me?" Steph demanded indignantly, standing in the corridor like a lemon.

"Up here," Ben slapped the back of the bench with his hand.

Steph gave him a quizzical look before clambering up onto the top, knocking everyone in the back of the head at least once with her bony knees (catching Mikey twice by 'accident').

"I really hate you, Stephenie." Mikey said conversationally, wincing as he rubbed his neck.

"I hate you too, Michael." Steph smiled brightly, settling into a comfortable position. "You know what? This isn't too bad actually; it's quite nice up here. I'm not that much higher than you twerps for once."

"What, you sick of the high altitude?" Kevin sneered.

"The lack of oxygen finally got to her," Ben said with a superior smirk, and the two of them started sniggering.

"Just pray we're not part of a multiple pile up," Mikey said with a smile. "You'll be the first through the window…"

"Though," Steph said thoughtfully, taking a handful of sweet from a bag she had bought earlier and shovelling them into her mouth. "In all fairness, I'd probably cope the best being thrown out a window. I'd healer faster,"

"Oh yeah…" Mikey said, tapping the play button absently. "Weirdo."

"Ssh!" Ben flapped his hands in Mikey's face, making him jump out of his skin. "No one interrupt the word of the messiah!"

They all turned to look at him in disbelief.

"But…Ben," Mikey said, as the fanfare blared from the tiny speakers and the three wise men followed the bright star towards the wrong stable.

"Don't you know?" Kevin said, eyes wide and mouth curling in a gleeful smile.

"There's no such thing as a Gruffalo!" Steph crowed, sitting up straight to spread her arms out joyfully.

They all turned as one and directed their disbelief at Steph.

"Hang your head in shame and _piss off_!" Mikey demanded of her. "_Never_ use such a classic children's book in relation to a Monty Python joke _ever_ again!"

Steph sulked grandly at him.

"So yes," Kevin said, poking a giggling Gwen in the ribs. "About what you were saying with regards to the messiah. What?" he said in response to Gwen's raised eyebrows. "River gave me some English lessons. I can use the word '_Thus!_' in the right context and everything!"

"He's not the messiah…" Mikey said, eyes raised to the heavens with a tired looking grin.

"HE'S A VERY NAUGHTY BOY!"

They all giggled like little schoolgirls for a bit until the opening credits finished, to which Steph and Ben imitated the woman singing – it sounded like a cat being strangled.

"The _Top Gear_ version was better." Mikey lamented as Jesus proclaimed his misinterpreted 'blessed are the cheese makers' line.

"What, the one where they went through the states being shot at for having 'Gay and Proud' badges on their cars, or the one where they went to the arctic?" Steph asked, picking at a spot on her wrist.

"The one when they were dropped in the Middle East and had to get to Bethlehem."

"Oh yeah!" Steph laughed. "That was the best!"

"Can't wait to see this years Christmas special!" Mikey grinned.

"Huh? Top Gear? That weird thing Steph once ranted about?"

"It's this TV show done by the BBC," Mikey explained as Gwen turned the volume up a bit, giving them a sour look. "Presented by these three brilliant idiots; James May, Richard Hammond and the oaf Jeremy Clarkson."

"He's my favourite," Steph said dreamily.

"He's a prick." Mikey snapped.

"He pisses you off. He's my _favourite_."

"Anyway…so _Top Gear_ basically is these three guys doing stupid things with cars, blowing up caravans, swearing at each other on camera, and getting celebrities to drive around their race course in reasonably priced cars and doing special challenges they set each other. There's a lot of good advice about cars and things – you know, there's actually something worth listening to, but a lot of people watch it because of the presenters doing stupid stuff. Every year they do a Christmas Special, and last year they were dropped in…Steph, where was it?"

"Somewhere near Arman." Steph said with a frown. "Began with an 'M'…? Dunno, I was too busy laughing at the Hamster's great escape from the plane."

"Sorry…_what_?" Kevin looked lost completely.

"Hammond's known as the Hamster because he's very short. He also had a really bad car crash while filming for the programme." He gazed out the window in dismay. "Possibly the world's fastest car crash, and it can't be entered in the _Guinness Book of World Records_. Such a shame…"

"Why not?" Kevin demanded, and started asking for details.

Mikey told him as much as he could remember; the speed of the rocket car, the break in the tyre, the pile drive into the ground at 230mph…the fact that if they wanted to enter it as a record he would have to do it again in the opposite direction and take an average.

"That's stupid." Kevin declared.

"Tell me about it!" Steph lamented.

"He's River's favourite presenter," Mikey went on undeterred. "Mainly because he did _Brainiac_, but also because he had similar brain injuries to her. She found the book he wrote about it fascinating,"

"I still think Clarkson's the best," Steph said smugly.

"He claimed to be the next messiah because his initials are J.C." Mikey said impatiently. "He bought a DS instead of frankincense because he's an idiot, he's always in the media because he's pissed off someone with his stupid racist jokes-"

"He pisses you off," Steph added with a cackle.

"So, about this Middle East thing," Kevin pressed.

Mikey laughed and said, "They didn't get shot at or anything, though they did go through several areas of conflict. But to give Clarkson due, he did stand there and say to the camera that what they were seeing was _nothing_ like what the news reports to us about the conflict areas. Not saying that there's no war going on," he said hastily as Ben rounded on him. "That was pretty obvious, but the worst thing that happened to them was one got bitten by an insect and had thus massive bandage on his arm, one got the runs – _badly_ – and James May cracked his head open in the Syrian desert."

Steph howled with laughter. "God that was funny!"

"You screamed when he fell over," Mikey reminded her. "Admit it, you thought he'd died!"

"So did River. And Miley, actually…"

"And they all appeared in drag when they reached their hotel, which was quite funny…" Mikey concluded.

"Oh!" Steph snapped her fingers, trying to remember something. "That thing…Clarkson made a quip at May about it…that song,"

"Huh?" Mikey struggled to remember.

"Said that May was serenading them with a carol service or something."

"Oh yeah!" Mikey cleared his throat loudly, then added as an after thought to Gwen, "Pause that a sec, would you?"

Gwen did so, looking resigned.

Mikey again cleared his throat, before he started singing James May's version of a well-known and beloved Christmas carol.

"We three blokes from BBC Two," Steph stuffed her fist into her mouth to keep from laughing. "One colour gold car one colour poo."

Ben snorted. "Excuse me?"

"Cause one of the cars was brown. Ssh!" Steph smacked him round the back of the head.

"Ohh!" Mikey swelled to a crescendo, more to make himself heard than for dramatic purposes. "Brought the wrong car brought the right! Working heat and working light!" he gestured with his hands as though he were driving a car. "Westward going gasket – maybe be blowing what a piece of-!" and then he bowed.

"What, aren't you going to say shite?" Kevin asked loudly.

"No. That's the point, the camera cut just before he finished the line. They aren't always clean with their language, but it made it all the funnier. British humour's a bit warped, these guys are prime examples. It's a case of that, by hiding the key word, which we can all work out anyway, makes it even funnier…if that makes sense…"

"What was it when J.C.'s car nearly broke down and the back up car came up behind them?" Steph interjected

"We three kings of orient are, one in a Vauxhall two in sports cars!" Mikey recited with a grin. Then, to answer Ben and Kevin's quizzical looks he said, "The challenge was they had to complete the task in a sports car of their choice in a budget of…whatever it was. And the backup car the producer was driving was a Vauxhall."

"What model?" Kevin asked, intrigued.

Steph laughed. "I'll see if I can get the box set off Gerald and lend it to you, I think you'd enjoy _Top Gear_. Miley and River couldn't give less of a shit about cars, but they watch it for the laughs." She stared dreamily out the window. "Wonder if we can get this year's Christmas special on TV…?"

Gwen coughed loudly and said, "Can we watch _Life of Brian_ now?" glaring at them all.

"Sorry," Mikey said, bowing his head and avoiding her eye, lest she punch him again.

He tapped the play button and they all settled down to watch the film, still unable to remain quiet for long; they all except for Gwen gave a running commentary, and in the end drove her to sitting on her bunk hunched over her book like a disgruntled vulture. Mikey felt somewhat ashamed, but it couldn't last when Steph was giving her best impersonation of each of her favourite actors; he had a soft spot for the _Monty Python_ crew, and he could never pass up an opportunity to join in with Steph once she really got going.

XOXOX

After a few days, Max decided it was safe to assume that the kids had all calmed down a bit, but then Mikey got his skype account working on Gwen's laptop with an improvised webcam Kevin had built. They managed to talk to the twins, Mel, and then finally River, whose Internet connection had gone down (amid much swearing on her end of the line). It was nice to see her again, although she kept walking back and forth in front of the camera, and cursing under her breath when her plans to redecorate were foiled.

"_Never have house plants_," she insisted to Kevin, who was laughing at her expense. "_Who the hell buys a hormonally pregnant woman a cactus anyway?_"

"They thought you'd appreciate the humour?" he ventured to suggest, getting hit from several different directions by the others.

"_Steph, do me a favour and slap him for me would you?_" River said loudly as she walked away from the computer with a large box, trying to compensate for her growing bump.

"Now, now, Dr Collins." Max said with a dry chuckle. "You're not supposed to turn them on each other."

River jumped and dropped the box in her hands. "_Crap!_" she gasped. "_I didn't know you were listening! What if you'd had one of the inspectors with you? I'd be _dead_!_"

Kevin and Steph roared with laughter until Ben reminded them that she could lose her job, and they both shut up instantly.

"_Aaahh_," River started tottering round in circles. "_I'm slowly losing my mind…what was left of it, anyway… Hey,_" she suddenly changed her mood again, making Ben sniggered and get punched in the arm. "_When you guys getting here?_"

"August," Max said promptly, trying not to laugh at the eager faces looking up at him. "Maybe even sooner…?"

"YES!" was the general consensus from the kids.

Leaving them to keep talking to River, and eventually striking up a chorus with Steph and Mikey of spin off songs from some TV programme they had all watched in England, Max went back to the front of the RV and reviewed his road plan they had been following. Deciding that they didn't really need to visit the next museum (devoted to the history of shoes), he drew a line on the map that bypassed the route he had planned earlier and followed the highway straight north by northwest.

"Ready to get going?" he called over his shoulder.

"Yeah!" three people yelled back as everyone standing scrambled for a seat.

"We're what…half way cross the continent now?" Mikey asked airily as Max threw the Rust Bucket into gear.

"Dude, have you _ever_ looked at a map of the US before?" Ben said disparagingly.

"Yeah! I drove cross country on a bike with my brother and sister if you remember, knuckle head." He snapped back.

"Hey Riv," Steph said in a sly tone, and then started singing. "Ohh, we're half way there…"

The others belted out the next line of, "Ohh-ohh! We're livin' on a prayer!" while River laughed on the computer.

Once the hilarity subsided, Gwen came to join Max at the front of the RV while the boys started fighting over the next film to watch and Steph plucked gloomily at one of Gwen's books.

Gwen stared up at Max for a few moments before he took his eyes off the road. "Yes, pumpkin?"

"Grandpa, did you know what you were letting yourself in for when you agreed to this?" she asked plainly, fighting a smile that tugged at her lips.

As he opened his mouth to reply, Mikey danced forwards, took an empty cup from the holder by the passenger seat, and sloped away, singing, "I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts…!"

Gwen stifled a giggle while Max shook his head.

He was too afraid to answer…

XOXOX

**Ha ha! I got there eventually xD may be shoddy work cause I haven't been in sync with my characters for a while, so I apologise for that.**

**I'd love to hear your thoughts and suggestions, I haven't really got a plan until they arrive in BC, and then I'm intending to spill into ultimate alien and warp that plot line for my own means ;) (remembering that I own nothing and reserve no rights except for the characters I made up myself – no copyright intended!)**

**So, farewell for now, hope you all had wonderful Christmas'/Hanukah/Kwanza/Insert your preferred winter celebration here/, and you all had amazing New Years Eve's :) I know it's a bit late, but happy new year all the same, and may it bring you many good and pleasant things in general :D**

**xxx**


	5. On The Job

**AN: hellooooooo world I'm still alive! xD I apologise most sincerely for the massive delay to this update, several things transpired to keep me from writing/uploading, including health, work, essays and the annoying fact that my laptop broke – physically and mentally, so I couldn't actually write anything for quite a while :/**

**But yeah, I'm back! Since I haven't been writing for a while I had a chance to rethink this story and going over it I'm getting bored and I think I need to move them all along up to BC and then back down for the next phase of the series. I dunno, let me know what you think! :D**

_**On The Job**_

Kevin sat like a hawk, watching everyone intently, feeling that something was up. Ben was texting Julie (regardless of the cross-continental cost), Gwen was reading _Darkfall_, and Mikey was prancing around the kitchen unit with his earphones in singing under his breath whilst pausing every so often to take out his phone and start texting someone. Steph was on the laptop talking to Mel on skype; nothing was out of the ordinary, and yet he couldn't help but feel _something_ was brewing…

Finally, Steph closed the laptop and went to get herself a drink. She took one look at his face and said, "Sup gargoyle?"

"Nothing," he snapped at her.

"You look pretty pissed off." She said conversationally.

Kevin grunted, and confided in her his feelings of forebode.

"Maybe Uncle Max's cooking tonight." She looked grave. "We've been trying to do it ourselves, but I dunno how much longer we can get away with it. _Sooner_ or later we'll have to eat his wombat omelettes…"

This did not make Kevin feel any better, so they sat side-by-side watching everyone else and trying to guess what was going through their minds. They deduced Ben was probably fantasising about Julie with smoothies and chilly fries (they both agreed to stop right there before they could imagine anymore and traumatise themselves); Gwen was probably analysing every sentence of _Darkfall_ she read; and Mikey was…less said the better as he started a jazzed up version of the Macarena with a spatula in each hand.

When they stopped for lunch and to have a look around the food market they parked alongside, Mikey kidnapped Gwen to go look for more bracelets, so Kevin followed while he left Steph to pester Ben.

At last he found out what Mikey had been doing; with a grin the older boy told him that Sally had been texting him to see how he was, while Mikey had been dancing to his newest most favourite song of all time.

"Listen," he said, jamming an earphone into Kevin's ear.

Kevin had to admit – strictly and clinically from a musical composer point of view, mind – it was pretty good, in an annoying, pop song sort of way. Kevin liked working on his car to heavy metal, when he wasn't listening to Reliant K or Water Potential. This sappy crap was too much like true pop for his tastes. It was some random guy singing about how he was stuck in the friend zone with this girl he'd been crushing on his whole life and how it was killing him inside.

"Boring," Kevin sighed, grabbing a box of strawberries and paying for them.

"Oooh!" Mikey bounced for a moment before holding out his arms and saying, "Don't move!" before he ran away.

Gwen blinked in amazement, and in no time at all he was back with a jar of chocolate spread – in milk _and _white chocolate.

"Not quite the same, but hey!" Mikey grinned.

They dunked the strawberries into the chocolate spread and ate them with relish while they looked around the stalls. In addition to their chocolaty treat, they also bought some fresh apples and oranges, which Kevin was sorely tempted to throw at Steph as she and Ben raced past with a box of home made clotted cream fudge, whooping loudly.

It wasn't until they were back on the road again and nearing a forest at the edge of the barren wastelands they had been driving through so far, that Kevin's premonition of nefarious brewing came about.

Gwen was still reading, Kevin was still brooding, and Steph, Ben and Mikey were locked in a heated debate about the differences between the original Disney film _Alice in Wonderland_ and the newer Tim Burton version of the same title.

"I _liked_ the talking door handle." Ben said stubbornly, arms folded like a petulant child.

"He wasn't in the book," Steph snapped.

"Be fair, the newer one had an _actual_ plot – the whole _point_ of _Alice in Wonderland_ is that there _is_ no plot. It's the nonsense of a mind that's high on opium."

"But the first one was _first_." Ben insisted. "It was a classic _way_ before Burton came along."

"Yeah?" Steph challenged. "The newer one has _Stephen Fry_ in it. End of." She sat back in her seat, looking smug.

"Huh?" Ben looked to Mikey for more information, but Mikey just clawed at the air dramatically.

"Goodbye, sweet hat…" he simpered to the tabletop.

Then it happened; a soft thud from outside the RV, far _far_ away so that it couldn't really be a thud. Kevin got up and looked out of the windscreen, and saw a thin stream of black smoke issuing from the forest up ahead.

"Hey, what's that?" he asked Max, pointing it out to him.

Max had had his eyes fixed on the road and the heavy traffic, so he hadn't noticed the column of smoke to his far left until Kevin had pointed it out.

"Hmm," Max frowned, hand tensing on the steering wheel as he weighed up his options.

"What is it?" Gwen asked, appearing at Kevin's elbow. She saw the smoke and called back to Ben, who tripped in his haste to beat Steph to the front of the RV.

"Hey!"

"Move it or lose it, Benny boy,"

"Oh dear, that doesn't bode well," Mikey said loudly over their squabble.

"Should we check it out?" Gwen looked to her grandfather.

Max checked his map. "It isn't going _too_ far out of our way…" he said, looking ahead for a turn off. "Here,"

"Want us to go check it out now?" Ben asked, reaching for the watch on his wrist.

"Not in the Rust Bucket!" Mikey and Gwen said in unison.

"Use your brain cell!" Steph aimed a swipe at him.

Max pulled off the main road and onto a bumpy looking lane that lead towards the trees directly. Kevin found a bread knife and absorbed the metal blade to cover himself; Steph went digging for the glove Cooper had made for her ages ago, which she had brought along 'just in case'. Mikey just flexed his arms and waited to get out of the RV before he phased.

They pulled up short right at the edge of the trees, and while Max went to grab some Plumber's gear the others filed out onto the patchy grass and got ready to check out the smoke. It was an old, and somewhat boring routine that Kevin was getting tired of; Ben suped as Swampfire, Gwen tucked her spell book into the pocket of her shorts, Mikey bounded forth and phased into his Lupus form, while Steph jumped into the air and phased in a flash of harsh, white light.

"Are you getting bored of this?" he asked Ben as they marched forth to investigate.

"How do you mean?" he asked in Swampfire's deep, gravely voice.

"We just do the same thing every time we're on patrol. Don't you think it's boring?"

"Not really," Ben shrugged, pausing long enough for Mikey to move out of the way before he blasted a path through the tangled under growth.

"Don't you think that might make the smoke matter _worse_?" Mikey called after him, padding forth on his four paws and looking very irritated.

"What do you think it is?" Gwen asked, joining Kevin by his side.

Before he could speak, Steph dived into the forest from above to give her bird's eye report. "There's a space pod, probably crash landed. Something humanoid fell out of it but the tracks just end. Could be any number of reasons I won't bore you with right now."

Kevin took out his badge and set it to scan the area for alien life forms. Of course, it came back telling him of the Human, Methanosian, the two Transmorphors, an Osmosian, and of course flagged up as Max began to catch them up – but that was it.

Steph took off again to circle the area, and Kevin and Gwen hurried after the other two. They found the site where the pod had crashed, and after a quick search of the area decided that Steph and Mikey should go check the forest in a three-mile radius for the survivor – it was obvious from the tracks that the person was injured.

Kevin kept tweaking the settings on his badge until it suddenly started beeping loudly and informed him that there was indeed another life form besides them and the trees.

"Look!" he called, showing Ben and Gwen. "Transmorphor…two of them,"

"Let's see," Ben said, snatching the badge from his hands. "Avis, and…what's that say?"

"Equus," Gwen supplied, showing Max. "Mikey, Steph!" she said, speaking into her own badge. "We've found two life forms…" she gave them the direction and distance relative to their position and turned to the two boys. "Shall we?"

Ben hit the sigil on his chest and dissolved into the young body of a lanky, hazel brown Lupus with bright green eyes, tail twitching. "I _love_ this form!" he said with a wolfish grin worthy of Mikey before he bounded off into the trees.

"I'll stay here with the ship," Max said, giving Gwen a little nudge after Ben. "Be careful, kids,"

Kevin and Gwen ran after Ben, and they were soon joined by Mikey who went barrelling after Ben on his long legs. Steph cooed from somewhere overhead, flying close to the treetops. It reminded Kevin of a mission they had run against the DNAliens, years ago it seemed now, in another lifetime – moving in a parody of a convoy.

Ben suddenly pulled up short, and Mikey skittered ahead a few feet as he tried to stop his momentum. At the same time Steph dived through the trees with a feral roar just before Kevin felt the temperature drop by several degrees.

"DUCK!" he yelled, flattening Gwen against the ground as a ball of ice went flying through the trees, slamming into an ancient oak that toppled over backwards with a horrible groaning sound.

Kevin ran to Steph's aid as she tussled with an unnaturally large palomino horse, while Mikey bounded forth with a snarl and gave chase to another bird that shrieked with fright. Ben tried to manoeuvre himself between the two Transmorphors that were attacking them and called out, "We mean you no harm! We're with the Plumber's-!"

The Equus screamed and aimed its front hooves at Ben's face, forcing him to dive out of the way and jump to avoid colliding with Gwen on the ground, throwing manna orbs at their attackers.

Steph started shrieking – something that sounded like another humanoid language, shot through with various birdcalls aimed at the other Avis. Kevin ducked under the Equus' flailing hindquarters to get a better look at the Avis, and saw what looked like a smaller version of Steph in blue tinged white, beating its wings towards the sky and screaming defiance. Steph landed on a nearby log and started cooing, but Kevin didn't see any more; he fell to the ground with a ringing in his ears that he didn't quite understand until he realised the Equus had kicked him in the back of the head. Covered as he was in metal, the contact made a horrible resounding clang, which also apparently spooked the horse. It reared onto its back legs with a scream and went careering into the trees, breaking several young saplings in half as it went.

"Follow that pony!" Mikey shouted, bounding after it.

"Wait! Mikey!" Ben yelled running after him. "Don't hurt it!"

The Avis tried to dive after Ben, but Steph leapt from her perch and landed heavily on its shoulder, pinning it to the ground. Gwen tugged on Kevin's arm, and he allowed her to pull him to his feet.

"This is supposed to be a holiday…" he groaned to her.

Steph was making soft cooing noises now as they approached, the other Avis' chest was raising and falling rapidly with its breathing. Large eyes the colour of liquid lilac stared up at them with abject terror. Kevin reached for his badge and engaged the universal translator so he could understand them both. At once the soft coos and whimpers became intelligible words.

"-We are not here to hurt you, all right? We can _help_. We're Plumbers,"

"You attacked us!" the voice was that of a young boy, barely any older than they were. "You attacked! We did nothing wrong! We were defending ourselves! This is _your_ fault-!"

"Please," Gwen knelt by his hand and laid a glowing hand on his neck. "We didn't mean to hurt or scare you. We thought _you_ were attacking _us_. What happened to your ship?"

The boy struggled a few moments more before he gave up and fell still. Gently, Steph disengaged her claws and stood up, beak stuck in the boy's crest to help him to his feet.

"Thank you," he said, flexing his aching wings. "Our parents' ship was attacked. They pushed us into the escape pod. We thought you had come to capture us!" he started bobbing on the spot like a worried robin. "Where's Cassie? What did you do to her!"

"Ssh," Gwen said softly, rubbing his neck the way Steph liked, and he again relaxed. Kevin noted the familiar glow of magic about her hands and guessed she was using a non-verbal spell to keep him calm. "It's all right. Mikey and Ben will bring her back,"

"I was supposed to look after her!" he shook his head from side to side and stamped his feet, almost like a little kid. Kevin could remember Crystal doing that when she had tantrums. "Cassie!" he yelled, trying to run forth.

Steph took a step back, and he tried to make a break for it, but she sat down on his tail, making him trip and fall over, once again stuck to the ground.

"Easy feather brain…" she said sagely.

Gwen contacted Max, and by the time he arrived Ben and Mikey had returned escorting the Equus girl in her human form. Kevin tried to hide his interest under dispassionate indifference as she walked past – he'd never seen an Equus in their human form before. Cassie was of average height for a young human adult, but had the look of a ten year old that had a lot of growing to do; as her horse form had showed, her skin was of a darkish tan, while her hair was almost white. She ran to the boy's side, phasing as she went and dived under his wings, shivering.

"Took a bit of convincing, that one." Mikey said heavily, flopping to the ground by Gwen's side and lounging like a lizard.

"You _so_ did not help," Ben scowled, turning back into himself and stalking over to stand by Steph.

She still stood in her Avis form, looking somewhat bored now that the excitement was over. "Uncle Max? What now?" she turned to their Magister, ignoring Mikey's glower.

"I'm going to contact the nearest base to dispatch a crew to go after their ship,"

Cassie whickered pitifully from behind the Avis.

"I'm sorry," Gwen said, getting up to lay a hand on his wing. "But we don't know your name."

"I'm Veerah." He said, looking at the ground as he spoke.

Kevin noticed the way that the feathers around Veerah's face seemed to puff up slightly, almost as though he were blushing…

"I'm Gwen. This is my cousin Ben, and our friends – Mikey, Kevin and Steph."

Veerah regarded them warily for a moment before he phased. Cassie now looked over the shoulder of a boy about the height of Steph's ribcage; extremely pale skinned, hair wild and tangled in white tipped in blue just as Steph's was tipped in red.

There was no mistaking it now – the guy was blushing.

Half wishing he hadn't let his armour go, Kevin strode forth and stood himself in between Gwen and Veerah, grabbing his hand to shake more firmly than the occasion warranted.

"Hi, pleased to meet you."

Gwen gave him a disparaging look, and Steph snapped her beak at him. Veerah jumped back in alarm, and Cassie started crying. Max sent Kevin and Mikey to go back to the Rust Bucket to pick up another communicator, but as they left the others out of ear shot Mikey sighed heavily.

"Seriously, mate,"

Kevin stopped walking in surprise, but Mikey kept pacing forwards through the broken undergrowth.

"You need to stop treating everyone like a potential threat."

"What are you talking about?" Kevin snapped, running to catch up.

"Someone so much as _looks_ at Gwen and you try to break their necks. Hand, in this case I guess…"

"What's _that_ supposed to mean?" Kevin said in a dangerously quiet voice.

Mikey snarled and leapt. Kevin wasn't anticipating this, so he keeled over backwards with a huge furry muzzle in his face.

"She loves you! Seriously! Get _over_ it!" Mikey backed up and strutted off with his head held high. "Gwen's not going to leave you _that_ easily. So stop trying to kill every would-be suitor. Makes you look desperate,"

"Hey!" Kevin ran at him, but Mikey had already started running, and he could outpace Kevin in this form any day.

XOXOX

Three hours later, and they were back on the road heading to their next overnight stop. They had managed to get the two Transmorphor children back to their parents, and saved the cargo vessel that had been attacked. All in a days work, as Mikey kept saying.

Ben wanted to hit him for it.

He sat sulking as Mikey and Steph started another heated debate about Disney, this time taking apart _Aladdin _piece by piece, including its two sequels and eighty-odd episode long TV series that they had watched avidly as kids.

Kevin fell into a seat beside Ben and stared at the two morosely. They gave each other a fleeting look before staring off in different directions.

"You as bored as me?" Ben asked the window, drumming his fingers against the tabletop.

"Nope." Kevin said promptly to the wall. "I'm depressed."

"Not a massive Disney fan?" Ben asked.

"I die a little inside every time Steph has a DVD night." He confessed.

"Dude, that's terrible. You should have said something, I'd've brought my _Sumo Slammer's: Season 1_ collection round, we could've watched that instead."

"Nah," Kevin waved it away vaguely, both still not looking at each other. "I'd rather listen to _Mikey Mouse_ all day long…"

Ben turned to give him a raised eyebrow. "Huh?"

"My sister likes _House of Mouse_. And she used to watch the _Mickey Mouse Club House_."

"Dear God," Ben fixed his friend with a look of abject horror. "You have my deepest sympathy!"

Kevin shrugged. "I think Kermit the Frog's the best," he added with a grin.

"Amen to that!" Steph crowed, having tuned into the last sentence of their conversation.

Everyone turned to stare at her.

"That…has…_nothing_ to do with Robin William's being a comedic genius, Steph." Mikey said slowly, shaking his head and looking despairing. Then, with suddenly wide eyes and a horror struck look, he said, "And…did you just say _Ay-men_ instead of _Ar-men_?"

"What? No!" Steph waved her hands wildly. "I didn't! I didn't!"

"Hahah!" Mikey howled with laughter.

Ben and Kevin sniggered behind their hands, watching her fume at them.

"Lost her accent." Ben nodded sagely.

"Reckon we should send her back to England?" Kevin stage whispered.

"What?" Ben yelled.

"I Said!" Kevin bellowed, fighting not to laugh at Steph's scowl. "I think we should sent her back to England!"

"Under what category?" Ben asked loudly.

"Defective product!"

Only once has Kevin witnessed the extent of Steph's true anger – this situation was nowhere near that stage, but it still hurt when she thumped him in the stomach. In all fairness, he deserved it, but it didn't stop him and Ben sniggering as Steph stormed off in a foul temper, kicking his kitbag as she went.

The two boys exchanged a high five, grinning at their accomplishment, when a book hit Ben in the face.

"Gah!"

Kevin looked around wildly to find the source so he could duck, but Gwen hit him with her wash bag.

"You two are _insufferable_!" she snarled.

"S'not _our_ fault she's sensitive," Ben said, wincing as he rubbed his nose. "And that _hurt_! Paper backs can kill you know,"

"Bully for them," Steph snapped from her bunk.

Mikey let his head hit the table. "No," he waved Gwen away. "Leave me here to rot. Let that which afflicts my brain and mind be that which afflicts my body."

"O…kay?" Gwen raised an eyebrow before moving away.

"Trying to be poetic." Ben shook his head condescendingly.

"And failing." Kevin nodded wisely.

"Too right,"

"Oh _shut up_…" Mikey groaned, covering his head with his hands.

XOXOX

They made a few more cultural stops along their way, and although they didn't encounter any aliens Mikey and Kevin managed to bring down a human criminal _almost_ single-handedly.

They had stopped at a street market, and a woman had started screaming about a man who had mugged her. Kevin had grabbed a length of rope to make a trip wire, and Mikey went to rugby tackle the goon – he managed to get the man at the knees, but he couldn't hang on, and the git managed to jump over Kevin's trap.

In the end, Ben saved the day by rounding the corner yelling for them to bus up because they were set to leave. The thief ran headlong into Ben and they both went crashing to the ground in a heap. Mikey dived to man before he could escape, accidentally catching Ben in the face with his elbow as he went.

All in all, it seemed quite a good experience, especially when the lady gave them each ten dollars to say thank you. Kevin had expected Steph to be hacked off about being left out, but she and Gwen just laughed at them as they boarded the Rust Bucket.

"Of all the times you've screwed up," Steph said to Ben as they drove away. "Of all the times you created problems when trying to fight crime – and now you just accidentally saved the day by walking ninety degrees to the right!"

Ben waved the note in her face. "No smoothies for you!" he said in a singsong voice.

"Doesn't matter," Steph flung an arm around Kevin's shoulders. "My mechanic buddy'll buy me one. Won't you mechanic buddy?"

Kevin stuffed the money into his pocket and fixed her with a serious stare. "I need new tyres."

She pushed him away with disgust. "I hate you,"

Mikey was perched on the edge of the table, tossing a coin in the air on the back of his hand. "You hate everyone equally and always have done. What's new?"

"What are you doing?" Gwen asked, joining Mikey at the table.

"See this?" he showed her a copper coin with a stamp sat face down on its surface. "Trying to stick it to the ceiling," he flicked his wrist and the coin went skyward, clanging against the roof, but the stamp didn't stick. "Aw, dang it!"

"_Why_?" Kevin sighed, sitting down on a seat and watching as Gwen got sucked into Mikey's game.

"Cause its fun. And it's what my dad and I used to do when we went on holiday during the summer. Steph played too, till she got too cool for it," he added in a snarky voice.

Steph was grandly ignoring him, so they went on trying to stick stamps to the ceiling as the RV rocked back and forth, weaving its way around traffic and potholes. It wasn't until much later that she spoke to them, only to inform them that she had been emailing Cooper on her smart phone and he had been bragging about his Plumber training.

"I don't _believe_ him!" she scoffed, showing them the offending message. "Lording it over us…_we_ didn't _need_ to go to the academy! We're awesome already,"

Kevin looked at the phone longingly.

"Sup?" she asked, nonplussed.

"They get all the _cool_ tech in the academy…" he sighed.

"Oh puh-_lease_…" Steph grumbled.

At the end of the day Max cooked them up something that looked like scrambled eggs on omelettes that weren't too bad until Steph found what looked like a miniature shark tooth in hers. Everyone spontaneously lost their appetite for unrelated reasons – especially Ben who suddenly turned very green and tottered off to the bathroom.

No one paid much attention until they heard the retching, and then Steph sighed in a resigned sort of way before she went to dutifully care for her sick friend.

"Why do we even have Miley? Steph's always done the medical stuff for us," Kevin said to Gwen as they sat on the couch.

Mikey shook his head. "Steph can't deal with on going illnesses like Miles can. She just does the shock stuff, blood and bandages – you know, that sort of thing. She's quite good at it, actually…"

"She does have two younger sisters and a little brother," Gwen pointed out.

"Yeah, I guess so." Mikey fished around in his bag for his bouncy ball, but couldn't find it. "I'm bored now…"

As it transpired, Ben had eaten something dodgy at the market, which was what made him so ill for a brief period of time. Steph grumbled at length about how no one else was kind enough to help look after him, to which Gwen announced she was a sympathetic puker, Mikey proclaimed, "But you're such a _caring_ member of the group! We thought you deserved all the honour that caring for the infirm entails," and Kevin simply said, "Yup."

That night no one slept very well because of the sudden rainstorm that sprung up, but by the time they got dressed and ate breakfast the next morning the puddles were already drying up by the sun. Steph poured over the map and found a nearby lake set in an animal park; she then spent the next half hour with Ben begging Max to let them go there for lunch.

They finally won because Mikey joined in the whining, and Gwen came over at the last moment just before the turn off, saying, "We could go fishing! It says you can in the guide book,"

Steph and Gwen made sandwiches while the guys dug out some old beach towels, and they invaded the park with great gusto.

As it turned out, there weren't that many fish in the lake, and they were all hiding from Mikey and Steph as they wrestled their way up and down the banks, screaming at each other loudly. Still, it was good fun, especially since lunch didn't involve any of Max's cooking, although they did end up leaving with a few more bumps and scratches than when they entered the park, since Mikey had given Gwen a hug, and Steph descended upon them yelling, "Dog pile!" and the others had jumped on them too.

"I can't wait till we get to Vancouver Island!" Mikey said excitedly, shaking his hair in a dog like manner and spraying water all over Ben.

"Why?" Ben snarled, wiping his face.

"Think of the havoc we could cause in Cowichan Bay!"

"Hey, we haven't seen the house yet," Steph said, aghast. She grabbed Gwen, who was wrapping her hair up with a towel like a turban. "What's it like? Tell me woman!"

"I told you already!" she blinked. "What else is there to tell? You'll see it anyway,"

"I was thrown into _space_ Gwen. _Space_! While you three gits were frolicking about on _my_ island-!"

"It's not _your_ bloody island!" Mikey said cheerfully, whipping her with his towel so she hit the roof. "It belongs to the Royal Family!"

"It does?" Kevin asked, trying to remember what little of history class he ever paid attention to.

Mikey nodded. "Yup. It's part of the Common Wealth, and many of the provinces were British Colonies. I know Vancouver Island was, they had this flag and everything…" while he recited the entire history of the island that he knew Kevin and Steph settled down to do some digging for various car parts they both needed, promising to sub each other for certain items and share specific tools.

"It's nice to see you not yelling at anyone for once," Gwen quipped them an hour later.

"Oh, it's mutual survival." Steph nodded gravely.

"Yeah, we'd be dead with out each other's support." Kevin added seriously.

"But don't worry," she patted Gwen on the arm. "We'll be screaming at each other again soon enough."

"Can't wait bud," they bumped fists.

"Too right you slag,"

"Bitch,"

"Mo-" Steph began, but was interrupted by Ben and Mikey singing _Amazing Grace_, extremely badly, by the kettle.

Kevin stood up and barrelled over to them while Steph shut the lid of the computer. "One moment, please." She smiled sweetly at Gwen before diving after Kevin. "Bitch Imma gut you like fish now!"

Gwen sighed, tracing the edge of the table with her finger.

"It was nice while it lasted," she said to the air."

XOXOX

**There you have it, not overly happy with it myself but there you go xD please do drop me a review with your thoughts and any suggestions you may have because I feel like I've run out of ideas for now!**

**xxx**


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